r 



^'S 




Book^P4 




Christian Consolations. 

— ,)/ 

SERMONS 

DESIGNED TO 

FURNISH COMFORT AND STRENGTH 



THE AFFLICTED. 



BY 

A. P. PEABODY, 

PASTOR OF THE SOUTH CHURCH, PORTSMOUTH, N. H. 



SEVENTH EDITION. 



BOSTON: 
AMERICAN UNITARIAN ASSOCIATION, 

1881. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1857, by 

Crosby, Nichols, & Co., 

in the Clerk's OflBice of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



PREFACE 



The following volume is a selection from the author's 
common parish sermons, written with no view to future 
publication, at wide intervals of time, and many of them 
with reference to individual cases of affliction. They 
are given to the public, not because they are deemed of 
peculiar value as discussions or as rhetorical compo- 
sitions, but solely in the hope that they may indicate 
the true sources of consolation and strength to the 
afflicted. The range of subjects may seem wider than 
the title would authorize ; but it has been thought that 
an additional interest might on that account attach itself 
to the work for readers in general, while the afflicted 
themselves may often derive more benefit from the 
adaptation of some one of the great doctrines of the 
Gospel to their peculiar condition and wants, than from 
discourses which treat directly of suffering, sorrow, and 
death. With this view, the sermons on the Life of the 



IV PREFACE. 

Affections, the Kingdom of God, and the Lord's Sup- 
per, have been deemed no less conducive to the general 
aim and purpose of the work, than those which relate 
solely to the discipline of an afflictive Providence. The 
volume is submitted to the Christian public, with the 
earnest prayer that it may be made the means of con- 
veying to a few at least of the sorrow-stricken else- 
where the consolations which it is the author's duty and 
privilege to dispense among the people of his charge. 

Portsmouth, N. H., December 5, 1846. 



[Sermons XXI. to XXY. inclusive were added in 
the second edition. Sermons XXVIII. to XXXIII. 
inclusive appear for the first time in the present edi- 
tion.3 I 



CONTENTS. 



SEKMON I. 

PAOR 
OUR NEED OP THE FATHER 1 



SERMON II. 
PATIENCE 14 

SERMON III. 

OLD AGE 29 

SERMON IV. 

A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE 40 

SERMON V. 

DESPONDENCY 51 

SERMON VI. 

THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS 61 



VI CONTENTS. 

SERMON VII. 

MEMORY 76 

SERMON VIII. 

SUDDEN DEATH . . , . ... . . 92 

SERMON IX. 

THE TRANSFIGURATION ....... 108 

SERMON X. 

THE RESURRECTION 123 

SERMON XI. 

THE ASCENSION 138 

SERMON XII. 

SOURCES OP CONSOLATION ...... 155 

SERMON XIII. 

CONSOLING VIEWS OP DEATH 166 

SERMON XIV. 

COME UP HITHER . .181 

SERMON XV. 

THE VANITY OP LIPE 192 



CONTENTS. Vll 

SERMON XVI. 

THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS 205 

SERMON XVII. 

TRUE LIFE . , 220 

SERMON XVIII. 

THE KINGDOM OF GOD . . . ... . . 233 

SERMON XIX. 

THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE 248 

SERMON XX. 

THE GADARENE DEMONIAC 260 

SERMON XXI. 

BEAUTY , . . 274 

SERMON XXII. 

CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE . . . . 286 

SERMON XXIII. 

HEAVEN 300 

SERMON XXIV. 

THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER 316 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

SEEMON XXV. 

THE-:JlEM0ilY OF GRIEF AND WRONG .... 328 

SERMON XXVI. 

COMMUNION OF THE DEAD WITH THE LIVING . . 340 

SERMON XXVII. 
THE lord's supper 349 

SERMON XXVIli. 

THE soul's SOLITUDE 36^ 

SERMON XXIX. 

HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR ...... 377 

SERMON XXX. 

THE CLOUD OP WITNESSES • . , . . . 391 

SERMON XXXI. 

AUTUMN 402 

SERMON XXXII. 

GREATER THAN MIRACLES 414 

SERMON XXXIII. 

ALL POWER god's 425 



SERMONS. 



SERMON I. 
ouB njeed of the father. 

I WILL ARISE AND GO TO MY FATHER. — Luke XV. 18. 

We need a full perception and deep sense of 
God's fatherly presence and love, more than all 
tilings else, to keep us safe from the snares of 
life, and to make us happy under its trials ; and, 
had I only a range of illustration and a power of 
impression corresponding to the glimpses of this 
great truth which flit before my mind, I would 
sepk no other theme, but should deem my minis- 
try best accomplished by pointing you contin- 
ually to your Father above, and reiterating the 
exhortation, — " Beloved, now are ye the chil- 
dren of God ; — see that ye bear the hearts, and 
lead the lives, of children." This exhortation 
we all need. The parable of the Prodigal Son 
1 



2 OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 

not only depicts the condition of the profligate 
and the irrehgious, but represents too faithfully 
the state of many Christians. For how few of 
us dwell constantly with Jesus " in the bosom of 
the Father " ! To how few of us, as regards the 
flow of our daily thoughts, could God say, — 
" Son, thou art ever with me " ! Though we 
have knelt before him in penitence, and daily 
draw nigh to him in praise and prayer, do we 
not at times forget the joy of his presence and 
the bread of his house, and let our hearts wan- 
der off into the far country, and hanker for its 
husks ? Still I believe that an infinite Father is 
a want of our nature, — a want felt by all, alike 
by the saint and the sinner, the glad and the 
wretched. Our souls are so made that they can- 
not lead fatherless lives without a sense of desti- 
tution and loneliness. The language of every 
heart that will interrogate itself is, — " Show me 
the Father." It is to this conscious need of a 
Father above that I would now direct your atten- 
tion ; and I may be able to interpret feelings to 
which you have given but little heed, or which 
you have experienced without understanding 
them. 

1. I would first recall your attention to seasons 
which must have marked more or less frequently 
the lives of all who hear me, — seasons of inward 
uneasiness without any outward cause. They 
come sometimes iu the dim solitude of evening 



OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 6 

or the quiet night-watches, sometimes in the yet 
deeper solitude of a heartless human throng. 
Though only voices of joy may be around us, an 
unbidden and irresistible melancholy steals over 
us. The dark side of life shows itself, however 
hard we strive to keep it out of sight. The out- 
ward objects wliich we are pursuing come up 
before us, stripped of their gay coloring, and in 
their utter flimsiness and frailty. We see what 
mere bubbles we are chasing ; — they burst and 
vanish from our sight ; and when we look again, 
it is upon a future void and blank. We can 
promise ourselves nothing. Weariness and doubt 
creep over our spirits ; courage to run the race 
of life fails us ; giant difficulties and perils rise 
before us ; and we cannot help saying to our- 
selves, — "How happy would it be, could we 
turn our faces to the sunny past, and lie down 
to our last sleep before the clouds now gathering 
meet, and the thunders break over our heads ! " 
At such times we hear from every connection 
and pursuit and trust upon earth the admonish- 
ing voice, — " This is not thy rest." We feel 
that our desire and toil have been for that which 
satisfied not ; and all seems " vanity and vexation 
of spirit." You have, I doubt not, my friends, 
passed through such seasons ; and, unless you 
have come to God in them, you have found no 
relief but in forcibly diverting the current of 
your thoughts by the bustle of business or of 



4 OUR NEED OF THE FATHER, 

mirth, to have them flow in upon your next lone- 
ly hour with added bitterness and gloom. 

But these seasons have a most important relig- 
ious significance. They are times when the soul 
asserts her right to higher goods and joys than 
earth can give, — when " the heart and the flesh 
cry out for God," — times, too, when the Father 
comes forth to meet us, and bids our weary and 
laden spirits repose on him. And at such sea- 
sons, when everything seems frail and fluctuat- 
ing, and there is nothing earthly on which we 
can rely or calculate, we do need an unchange- 
able point of support, — something on which we 
may fix our swimming and bewildered eyes, till 
they recover their steadiness of vision. We need 
the unslumbering eye, the undying love, of the 
Almighty. We need to have the voice sent home 
to our spirits, — "Fear not thou, though the 
earth be removed, though the heavens be no 
more ; for He who laid the foundations of the 
earth and meted out the heavens is thy Father 
and thy Friend. This, thy God, shall be thine 
for ever. The Most High is thy refuge, and un- 
derneath are the everlasting arms.'' Nothing 
but this assurance can light up the hours when 
we muse and are sad, and change the spirit of 
dark reverie into that of praise and gladness. 
But there are no seasons when the Christian 
more heartily enjoys the luxury of communion 
with God, than during these hours which begin 



OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. O 

with melancholy. They are indeed the soul's 
night-seasons ; but they are like those glorious 
nights in our northern sky, when the bright bow 
of God spans the firmament and floats among 
the stars, and the lambent fires from the horizon 
shoot up to meet it, and the whole heavens are 
telling of the glory of the Most High. 

Jesus constantly made little children examples 
for his disciples ; and in our hours of weariness 
and sadness, we may well take pattern from them. 
Tiie infant has his seasons of weariness, when 
the day has been long, his sports have all been 
tried in their turn, and his slender resources are 
exhausted. He grows vacant, restless, and un- 
happy. But to what does he have recourse ? 
He buries himself in his mother's arms ; and 
then his tears are dried, his smiles return, and 
the fountain of gladness wells up anew from his 
heart. Thus the true child of God, when daz- 
zled and wearied by the glare of day and the 
phantoms of life, casts himself on the bosom of 
his Father in the prayer of faith, and receives 
from the spirit never sought in vain such peace 
as the world cannot give. 

2. We feel, it seems to me, peculiar need of a 
Father in heaven, in our communion with the 
fair and glorious scenes of nature. Did you ever 
see a little child taken by his father to see some 
glittering pageant, which seemed to the child 
immensely vast and grand ? And have you not 
1* 



6 OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 

marked how the child will at short intervals look 
away from the gay show to his father's face, as 
if to fortify himself by a glance of love ? And, 
in these glances, does he not tacitly confess him- 
self dazzled and bewildered by the sight, and 
able to look upon it only as supported by his 
father's eye ? Not unlike emotions many of you 
must have felt, when you have stood by the 
ocean or on the mountain-top, or when you have 
considered the heavens, and beheld the stars, as 
" at the commandment of the Holy One they 
stand in their order, and never faint in their 
watches." You have felt bewildered and lost, 
lonely and desolate ; you have been overwhelm- 
ed by a sense of vastness and immensity; and 
a silent, shuddering awe has come over you. 
These emotions are the child's yearning for the 
father's eye. You feel thus because you cannot 
support the consciousness of solitude and deser- 
tion in the boundless universe. You cannot bear 
to find yourself mere atoms in the outward crea- 
tion, filling a smaller place in the great sum of 
being than a single leaf in the forest or a drop in 
the ocean, unless there be revealed to your dis- 
tinct consciousness One who numbers the hairs of 
your heads and the sands of your lives. Were 
I an atheist, I would cut myself off from every 
grand view of nature, would shun the mountain 
and the ocean, and shut my eyes against the 
crimson sunset and the gemmed vault of night ; 



OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 7 

for all these things would tell me what a solitary 
being I was, and how unsheltered, — they would 
speak to me of a stupendous machinery beyond 
my control, of gigantic powers which I could not 
calculate, of material forces which my boasted 
intellect could neither comprehend nor modify. 

This sinking of heart, which I see not how an 
atheist could ever subdue, we all feel, when we 
look at the works of God for the mere gratifica- 
tion of curiosity or taste. There is always a 
straining of the eye and thought beyond what 
we can see, — a yearning for a spiritual presence 
in the heights and depths of nature. When we 
contemplate the heavens, when we mark the 
paths of the deep, when we ascend to the birth- 
place of the rivers and the fountains, we are not 
satisfied, unless we meet some intelligent re- 
sponse to our earnest, searching glances; — it 
wearies and repels us to think of these things as 
mere lifeless forms. The inquiry almost mounts 
to our lips, — 

" Live not the stars and mountains ? Are the waves 
Without a spirit? Are the dropping caves 
Without a feeling in their silent tears ? " 

But how does it fill and warm the heart to see a 
fatherly presence in the glow of night, in the 
mist upon the mountain-top, in the waterfall and 
the ocean, — to look upon all these forms as but 
the varied God ! 

3. In our domestic relations, we also deeply 



8 OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 

feel the need of a Father in heaven. How short- 
lived the family on earth ! How frail the tie 
that here makes us one ! In the most painful 
emergencies, how little can we do for each other 
to heal disease, to avert sorrow, to roll back the 
shadow of death! One after another of the cir- 
cle is called away ; but our hearts only cleave 
the more closely to those that remain. We draw 
out our whole power of love ; yet the objects of 
our love seem the mere sport of fickle elements, 
and may be taken from us at a moment's warn- 
ing. How deep, then, our need of one to whom 
we can look as the Father of us all, — to whom, 
together or apart, we can commend each other 
with unfaltering faith, — and in whose house, 
though the departed and ourselves may for a 
while tenant different mansions, we cannot feel 
divided ! 

To a parent, above all, is this faith in the 
Supreme Father of unspeakable value. To have 
a helpless being intrusted to one's care, with 
hosts of diseases and accidents thronging around 
the very gates of life, to know that a rude breath 
may quench the flickering vital spark, to be so 
often baffled in one's own plans and measures, 
and then to look around upon the multitude of 
early graves, — who could, in view of all these 
things, find courage to go forward in the discharge 
of a parent's duties, witliout the assurance that 
the little flock have a Heavenly Shepherd, whose 



OUR NEED OP THE FATHER. 9 

breath will feed their life, whose staff will guide 
their steps, and who, both on earth and in heaven, 
bears the lambs in his arms and carries them in 
his bosom ? Then, too, when we think of their 
moral exposures, of the snares that are laid for 
them, of the evil that they must encounter, of 
the many whose first steps are in the ways of 
death, whence should we derive confidence to 
place them on the theatre of moral action and 
discipline without trust in the Father, who loves 
them better than we can, who will make us suf- 
ficient for our work if we lean upon his counsel, 
who will not suffer the prayer of faith to return 
to us void, and in whom we can look forward to 
a distant harvest season, if the seeds of Christian 
instruction do not spring up and bear fruit at 
once ? yes ! we need the protecting provi- 
dence and the regenerating spirit of our Father 
for the ground of immovable trust, at every stage 
of our domestic experience, — else we might well 
resign our charge and remit our efforts, ex- 
claiming in despair, " Who is sufiicient for these 
things ? " 

4. Finally, as sinners, we need a Father in 
heaven. There is one class of inward expe- 
riences in which every Christian feels this need. 
It is the class to which St. Paul refers, when he 
says, — " The good that I would, I do not; but 
the evil which I would not, that I do. I delight 
in the law of God, after the inward man ; but I 



10 OUR NEED OF THE FATHEH. 

see another law in my members warring against 
the law of my mind." How often, nay Christian 
Mends, do our attainments fall short of our aims ! 
How often are we betrayed into sudden sins of 
thought or speech ! How frequently will the very 
frame of temper which we have the most ear- 
nestly striven to subdue rise, on some unforeseen 
occasion, and surprise us into some form of speech 
or conduct to be looked back upon with unfeigned 
sorrow ! And at such times, it seems as if all 
our toil had been in vain ; and we are ready to 
cry out in bitterness, — "0 wretched man that 
I am ! who will deliver me from this body of 
death ? " Often, when we look back upon a day, 
we see that through its hours the spirit has been 
willing, but the flesh weak, — the law of love and 
fidelity for the most part present to the mind, 
and yet little unkindnesses and negligences strewn 
here and there, testifying to momentary victories 
of impulse over principle. With our holiest ef- 
forts and desires, with our best services, there 
are blended so many imperfections, as to leave no 
room for a self-complacent thought, and to fill our 
hours of self-recollection with the consciousness 
of infirmity and short-coming. We find, also, 
that our besetting frailties and sins often place us 
on a false footing with our fellow-men. Under 
transient impulse, we often manifest traits that 
form no part of our established characters. We 
may have hearts full of love ; and yet some con- 



OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 11 

stitutional infelicity may often check or pervert 
the utterance of our kind affections. We may 
have glowing religious zeal, and an earnest long- 
ing to render active and effectual service to the 
cause of piety ; and yet diffidence or unreadiness 
may tie our hands and palsy our tongues, and 
we, with full hearts, may seem cold and dead, 
while others, with even less inward fervor, can 
tell their joy, and bear about the message of 
their God. 

Under such experiences, we need to turn from 
our own frailty to our heart-seeing Father, with 
whom our witness is in heaven, our record on 
high. We need to appeal from the malign judg- 
ment of the world, nay, from the self-reproach of 
our own baffled and discouraged hearts, to Him 
who "knoweth what is the mind of the spirit.'* 
To him we may say, — "Thou, God, hast 
searched me, and known me. Thou hast seen 
my aims ; thou hast beheld my failures and my 
transgressions. Judge thou me, my Father, 
not according to my sins, which are ever before 
me, but according to my desire for thy service and 
my delight in thy law." How quietly does the 
little child rest in the spirit of filial confidence, 
implicitly trusting his father's readiness to for- 
give ! He may often have failed and fallen. Yet 
did he have all the while a filial spirit ? did he 
desire to do right ? was it his prevalent wish and 
aim to obey? In all his self-reproach for his 



1^2 OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 

transgressions, however frequent, he still, with 
the rectitude of a filial heart, reposes on his Fa- 
ther's love, and knows that he is forgiven and 
accepted. Thus may we, children of God's great 
family, though we proffer no claim of merit, and 
bow under a deep sense of unwortliiness, cherish 
an undoubting confidence in the Father, whose 
forgiving mercy breathed in the words, and flowed 
in the reconciling blood, of the Lord Jesus. 

I have thus, inadequately I fear, but in the lan- 
guage of deep conviction, set before you our need 
of a Father in heaven. Could we but lead a 
strictly filial life, could we walk, as Jesus did, 
ever in the felt presence of our Father, how would 
the spirit thus given us satisfy our worthy desires 
and repress our aimless strivings, sustain us in 
trial and comfort us in sorrow, quench the terror 
of the grave and make death an angel of light ! 
In God's fatherly care and love, there ever comes 
to us the voice, — " Be thou careful for nothing, 
but in everything give thanks. Cast thy bur- 
den upon the Lord. Move on in the path of 
duty ; and calmly wait, till the Father calls thee 
from thy service on the dusty pavement of earth 
to minister before him in the starry courts of 
heaven." 

Brethren, are we partakers of this spirit of 
adoption? Have we felt its blessedness in our 
homes, on the bed of languishing, at the grave- 
side ? How,' then, can we be mdifferent to the 



OUR NEED OF THE FATHER. 13 

desolation and misery of those who live in spir- 
itual orphanhood? For them let us pray, let us 
labor ; and thus fulfil the law of Christ, and man- 
ifest ourselves the true children of Him who 
lights his sun and sends his rain upon the un- 
thankful and th^ evil. 



SERMON II. 



PATIENCE. 

LET PATIENCE HAVE HER PERFECT WORK, THAT TE MAT BE 
PERFECT AND ENTIRE, WANTING NOTHING. — JameS L 4. 

I NEVER feel more strongly the divinity and 
perfectness of the Christian system, than in read- 
ing the works of those classic authors whose mo- 
rality makes the nearest approach to the Christian 
standard. There is always some rough point 
which juts out to mar what might otherwise seem 
faultless, — always some essential virtue lacking 
in the catalogue, or some vice, like Satan clothed 
in robes of light, placed in strange companionship 
among the virtues. I have of late read much, 
and with both pleasure and profit, in the moral 
treatises of Seneca, who has been often and just- 
ly styled the almost Christian moralist. But in 
morals, that one word almost is a fatal word. 
The omission of one cardinal virtue, or the glori- 
fication of a single vice, is enough to give sin free 
entrance and an established foothold. The chief 



PATIENCE. 15 

fault that I find with Seneca is his omission of 
patience from his list of virtues ; and from this 
omission, unessential as some might deem it, 
there flow the most revolting and fatal consequen- 
ces. He gives many admirable precepts, worthy 
the heed of the Christian warrior, for contending 
with the evils of life, and destroying their power 
l)y exterminating them. But, if they exceed mor- 
tal strength, and cannot be overcome, he repre- 
sents it as beneath a wise or a brave man to bear 
them, when it is so easy to leap out of existence. 
The duty of suicide in preference to unavoidable 
and incurable outward evil is one of his favorite 
topics, and frequently forms the nauseating close 
of a paragraph, on which, up to that point, you 
are ready to exclaim, " How truly Christian ! " 
He is perpetually citing as the paragon of virtue 
Cato, whose principal achievement was his delib- 
erate self-murder. 

The very field of discipline, which the heathen 
moralist thus precluded for his disciple, is that 
on which the precepts and example of Jesus are 
the most full and clear. The necessary evils of 
life are the pavement of precious stones on the 
highway to heaven. Patience occupies a place 
second to no other grace of the Christian char- 
acter. It clothed our Master like a robe on his 
weary sojourn, and sat on his brow like a jewelled 
diadem in the hall of Pilate and on the mount 
of crucifixion. The Gospel, indeed, excludes not 



16 PATIENCE. 

courage ; but prefers in honor its gentler sister 
"sdrtue. Courage is an occasional act or effort of 
the soul ; patience, a continuous habit. Courage 
is the mission of some ; patience, the duty of all. 
Courage courts observation, and sustains itself by 
every possible outward prop and stimulus ; pa- 
tience is lonely and quiet, — its warfare is with- 
in, — its victory, without sound of trumpet, for 
the eye of God and the award of heaven. Cour- 
age may give its strength to evil, and may nerve 
the arm of the thief or the manslayer ; patience 
dwells only in the bosom of piety, and always be- 
holds the face of her Father in heaven. 

I now ask your attention to a few remarks de- 
signed to illustrate the necessity and the means 
of cultivating the virtue of patience, and the 
mode in which it so reacts upon the whole char- 
acter as to make the patient disciple " perfect 
and entire, lacking nothing." 

The necessity of this virtue can hardly be over- 
rated. Our Saviour said, with literal truth, — 
" In the world ye shall have tribidation." Who 
escapes it ? No one can feel more fully than I 
do, that God has placed us in a good world, and 
has put within the reach of us all a large prepon- 
derance of happiness over misery. With most of 
us, life rolls on calmly through childhood and 
early youth, and for long portions of our later 
years. But few approach middle life without 
some experience of sorrow, — seasons of sickness 



PATIENCE. 17 

and infirmity, heavy disappointments, weary vig- 
ils with suifering parents, children, and kindred, 
— times when the floods lift their angry voice 
and the billows break over us, — times when 
nothing seems stable but the throne of God and 
the hope of heaven. And these visitations of 
Providence are not momentary, so that they can 
be met by a sudden and defiant effort ; but they 
are prolonged, continuous, spreading out into the 
future, and the end is not yet, but is beyond our 
foresight and calculation. For some, also, the 
sun is darkened long before midday ; and they, 
though not without kind reliefs and rich bless- 
ings, must move on beneath clouds which only 
the resurrection morning will scatter. Poverty, 
desolation, or chronic infirmity is their appointed 
sphere of duty, their only portion, till they ex- 
change it for Abraham's bosom and the inherit- 
ance of the righteous. And these darker scenes 
and portions must be met either in ceaseless dis- 
content, murmuring, and distrust, or in that spir- 
it of quiet, trustful patience, which says, — "Fa- 
ther, not my will, but thine, be done ! " But for 
those that murmur, blessings left and comforts 
sent are wasted, and there hangs over their dwell- 
ings and about their spirits an impenetrable 
gloom ; while to the patient and confiding soul 
light arises in darkness, — the cloud cannot hang 
so thick and heavy, but that rays of divine love 
struggle through its fissures and fringe its edges, 

2* 



18 PATIENCE. 

— it is spanned by the bow of promise, with the 
inscription, — "I will never leave nor forsake 
thee." 

Among the means of cherishing patience, I 
would first name a deep and enduring sense of 
the love of God, and of the merciful purpose of 
all his dispensations This we all confess in 
words ; but we must feel it. Our theoretical 
faith is right and sound ; the great object is to 
bring our feelings up to the standard of our 
avowed belief. This faith must work itself into 
the whole texture of our souls, pervade and fill 
our hearts, and be as the life-blood of our inward 
being. " God is love," — " God is our Father," 

— these divine words must enter into our con- 
sciousness, be inwardly digested and assimilated. 
And this can best be done in those early, happy 
days which are bathed in the Creator's smile, on 
all whose moments hang the dew-drops of his 
blessing. This needed faith in a fatherly Provi- 
dence parents should teach their children, when 
they are full of joy ; and the young, prosperous, 
and always happy should grow into it more and 
more in daily adoration and thanksgiving. We 
should look back upon the way in which our Fa- 
ther has led us, and mark its special deliverances 
and favors. We should look around us, and trace 
back through their earthly sources to their eter- 
nal fountain the streams of mercy flowing hoiuv 
ly upon our homes and our daily walks. There 



PATIENCE. 19 

has been, there is, enough in the life of each of 
us, if we would only -ponder upon it, to draw 
forth the confession, with gratitude too full for 
utterance, — " God has nourished me as a child, 
— in ways and times witliout number lie has re- 
vealed himself as my Father and my friend, — I 
indiAddually am the distinct object of his care 
and love, — how precious are thy thoughts of 
mercy towards me ! how great is the simi of 
them ! — should I count them, they are more in 
number than the sands of the sea." 

This spirit will give us patience, when the evil 
days come. We shall know that disease and 
affliction are but altered forms of mercy, or- 
dained with kind purpose and for a blessed min- 
istry, — that outward trial is sent to heal inward 
disease, to establish the soul in firmer health and 
fuller strength, to shed into it the peace of God 
and the spirit of heaven. We shall lean in faith 
upon a Father, whose ways seem dark to us only 
because we are children and fall short of our 
Father's wisdom. We shall calmly yield our- 
selves to the guidance of Him whose appointed 
way must needs be the surest, safest path to 
heaven. Our trust will be confirmed by exercise 
and deepened by experience, so that every new 
period of trial will give to patience its more and 
more perfect work. Our early trials, if submis- 
sively borne, will leave in our hearts a work of 
grace, which we can mark and recognize. We 



20 PATIENCE. 

shall see and know that they made us better, — 
that they made our prayers more fervent and 
more constant, our love to man more tender and 
enduring, our sympathies quicker and stronger, 
our tempers more meek and gentle, our tastes 
more pure and spiritual. We shall bear so con- 
sciously these blessed fruits of an afflictive Provi- 
dence, as to leave no room for doubt and mis- 
giving, and to fortify our faith in the word of 
God by a voice within, which we can neither 
suppress nor gainsay. 

Again, patience derives nourishment from the 
hope of heaven, — not from the mere belief in 
immortality, but from the personal appropriation 
and consciousness of it. "What makes courage 
a much easier virtue than patience is, that it is 
called into exercise for a crisis which will soon 
be passed, and beyond which hope easily extends ; 
while patience belongs to those protracted trials 
which offer no immediate or definite hope of their 
termination. We think little of a rough road or 
a bad inn, if the end of our journey is near and 
attractive. We cheerfully encounter temporary 
inconveniences and troubles, if fully assured that 
they are to be followed by long and unbroken 
quietness and prosperity. Did we let our con- 
templations rest habitually on eternity, all our 
earthly trials would in like manner seem light 
and short, and not worthy to be compared with 
the joy set before us. This consideration enters 



PATIENCE. 21 

largely into all patient and submissive suffering. 
Many there are, indeed, who well know that their 
first bed of rest will be the grave, but who are 
made cheerful and happy by a near and constant 
^iew of the home where sickness, pain, and sor- 
row can find no entrance. 

Patience receives, also, ample support from the 
life and example of Jesus. In him the disciple 
learns that whom the Lord loves he chastens. 
He sees that trials cannot be sent in anger, when 
the best beloved Son had their full weight laid 
upon him. He feels strengthened to tread the 
path and to bear tlie lot which Jesus has made 
illustrious by his own victory and triumph. Pov- 
erty, desolation, acute bodily suffering, have all 
been consecrated by his homeless wanderings, his 
rejection, agony, and cross. 

None find themselves so severely afflicted, but 
that in the outward circumstances of his toilsome 
and painful pilgrimage they can see traces of yet 
severer suffering and agony. Yet we behold him 
calm, patient, submissive, trustful. Not a mur- 
mur escapes him, not an unconditional prayer for 
relief. His patience is tried at every point, both 
by the mysterious hand of an afflictive Provi- 
dence, and by the malice and scorn of the wick- 
ed. He encounters ingratitude in its most re- 
volting forms, persecution from those whom he 
had striven to bless, insult and ignominy alike 
from the supercilious great and the sycophantic 



22 PATIENCE. 

mob. The Jew gives him over to the Gentile; 
the Gentile hands him back, scourged and buffet- 
ed, to the Jew ; and the Jew again transfers him, 
lacerated and mangled, to the foreign execution- 
er. But, beneath their jeers and taunts, tossed 
from one coarse hand to another in the crowd, 
grasping the mimic sceptre, with his temples torn 
bj the thorns, he wears in his unmoved serenity 
a kingly aspect, which strikes admiration and 
awe into many rude hearts, and constrams the 
<man of blood, who watches by the cross, to ex- 
claim, — " Surely this was the Son of God." 
This beautiful example of patience the Christian 
contemplates, till it transfuses itself into his own 
soul, till the cross gives him strength, till he can 
enter into the secret of the Saviour's submission, 
peace, and joy, and can say with him, — " Not as 
I will, but as thou wilt ! " 

But this life is a school for heaven, and we are 
accustomed to believe that we learn lessons here 
to practise there, — that the virtues which we are 
here to acquire most sedulously are those of 
which we shall have the greatest need in the life 
to come. Is not patience an exception ? We can 
have no occasion for its exercise in heaven ; — 
why, then, assign it so prominent a place in the 
Christian character ? This question will be best 
answered by considering the uses of patience. 

Under this head I first remark, that there is 
one work which we must all accomplish, would 



PATIENCE. 23 

we enter heaven, — namely, the formation of spir- 
itual characters, the establishment of the suprem- 
acy of the inward over the outward, of the soul 
over sense, of tilings unseen and eternal over 
things seen and temporal. The world, in one 
way or another, must be overcome, — the prefer- 
ence for external and perishing goods subdued, 
— the overmastering love of what is inward and 
spiritual planted firmly in the soul. It is to ac- 
complisli this warfare that we are placed here, 
that by means of it the soul may grow and get 
strength, and all its higher powers be drawn out 
in hardy and self-sustaining vigor. This, how- 
ever performed, is an arduous process ; but per- 
haps not more so for those whose discipline is 
that of frequent or protracted suffering, than for 
the prosperous and happy. Nay, I doubt not that 
in the sight of Heaven seemingly opposite lots 
may occupy the same level as to actual enjoy- 
ment, if connected with similar moral develop- 
ments ; and, for one who would win heaven, it 
may be that the trials of health, prosperity, or 
riches are no less severe than those of sickness, 
adversity, or penury. They are, indeed, of a dif- 
ferent class ; and because they are not so fre- 
quently regarded as occasions of moral discipline, 
they appear less. But for those who are rich, 
and full, and strong, if they would reach favored 
places in the heavenly kingdom, there must be a 
course of self-restraint, self-denial, and self-renun- 



24 PATIENCE. 

elation, — there are numberless allurements to be 
resisted, innocent desires to be kept innocent by 
their moderate indulgence, an engrossing world, 
with its countless attractions, to be pushed back, 
bj constant efifort, from the inmost citadel of the 
affections to that second place which it rightfully 
occupies. Most of this work Providence performs 
for the suffering disciple, — appointing him, in- 
deed, a discipline of a different kind, no less ar- 
duous, but I believe not more so, than those of 
us who are prosperous and happy would no doubt 
feel, if we did our work as faithfully as we love 
to see the afflicted do theirs. And herein lies 
one essential office of patience, in the spiritualiz- 
ing of the character ; and how beautifully and 
effectually it does this many of us can testify, 
from our having felt nearer heaven in the abode 
of penury, or by the bed of chronic illness, than 
in the gayest and brightest scenes that have fallen 
within our experience. 

Then, again, in no form does a Christian ex- 
ample seem more attractive, and win more honor 
to the Christian name and character, than in pa- 
tience under severe trial and suffering. Piety, 
indeed, is in the sight of God the same, under 
whatever form ; but by man it cannot be equal- 
ly appreciated in all conditions of life. In pros- 
perity and joy, there will always be the sneering 
and sceptical, who will repeat Satan's question, — 
" Doth Job serve God for naught ? " But touch 



PATIENCE. 25 ' 

the disciple in his dearest earthly interests, bow 
him down under severe affliction, and if he then 
holds fast his faith and trust, if he is serene and 
happy, if he talks of the goodness of God, and 
manifestly dwells in inward peace and quietness, 
there is no room left for cavilling. We can see 
and calculate the burden under which the spirit 
rests, and the obstacles against which it struggles ; 
and we may estimate the strength of its faith and 
principle by the weight which it can lift and bear 
with ease and joy. No examples are so powerfid 
as these in commending the religion of the cross. 
Multitudes have been reclaimed by them from in- 
difference and scepticism. Multitudes have been 
led by them to meditate, as they never had be- 
fore, on the sufficiency of the Gospel, and to 
believe and confess it the power and wisdom of 
God unto salvation. 

God means that we should all be examples to 
one another ; that, while we save our own souls, 
we should shine for the salvation of others ; and 
that thus the world should from generation to 
generation become more and more filled with 
lights on the heavenward path. We read in the 
Bible of the integrity of Joseph, the patience of 
Job, the early piety of Samuel, the firmness of 
Daniel, the zeal of Peter, and the love of John. 
God means that the life of each one of us shoidd 
be, for those around us, and for those to come 
after us, such a scripture as is the life of each of 



26 PATIENCE. 

these holy men. In Jesus his whole will and law 
were written out in living characters. What he 
was, God means that each disciple should be in 
his own sphere and measure, — each the special 
embodiment of some part of his communicable 
attributes, mingled, as they must appear, in dif- 
ferent proportions, and with different degrees of 
lustre, according to the theatre on which they 
are to be displayed. Each living gospel, by its 
own" peculiar blending of divine traits and mani- 
festations, may have a peculiar charm and power 
for some soul, which others will not reach, and 
may thus do its part towards leading fellow-men 
to righteousness and heaven. This office, as I 
have said, seems to be performed with superior 
felicity and power by those whose mission it is 
to suiFer rather than to do. In their humility 
and self-distrust, their only regret often is, that 
they can do nothing for the glory of God and the 
honor of their religion ; while, from the retired 
scene of their calm and trustful endurance, as 
from a tribunal of world-resounding eloquence, 
there may be constantly going forth the most 
deep-reaching and effectual lessons of truth, duty, 
and piety. 

I remark, in closing, that patience is not a vir- 
tue to which even death sets limits. It belongs 
to heaven and to eternity. What! you ask, — 
patience in heaven ? Will there be sufferhig 
there ? By no means. But what is patience ? 



PATIENCE. 27 

It is implicit faith and trust, exercised in the 
darker scenes and vicissitudes of life. These 
scenes will brighten into the perfect day, — these 
vicissitudes will be merged in the great change, 
when tlie corruptible puts on incorruption ; but 
the faith and trust of which they were the the- 
atre will live for ever, and be for ever needed. 
There will be mysteries in heaven as well as 
here, things to be taken on faith before they can 
be fully known, portions of the vast administra- 
tion of God, in which, in our ignorance, we must 
cast ourselves in humble reliance on his wisdom 
and goodness. Our faith, our trust, must go be- 
fore us on our career of growing knowledge, 
power, and holiness, always hovering on the 
limit of what we already see and know, and har- 
monizing and equalizing to our apprehensions 
what we cannot fathom or understand. 

I have thus spoken of the necessity, the aids, 
and the uses of patience. It makes life beautiful. 
It sheds a calm and heavenly glory upon the bed 
of death. As we watch the passage hence of one 
who has been baptized into the likeness of our 
Saviour's sufferings, in the hushed stillness of 
entire submission, in the peace of God and the 
atmosphere of prayer and praise, we seem in a 
heavenly presence, and almost listen for the an- 
gel wings that bear a kindred spirit to the throne 
of God and the communion of the unsuffering 
and the ransomed, while every regretful thought 



28 PATIENCE. 

is checked by the voice tliat bade the seer of Pat- 
mos write, — "Blessed are the dead tliat die in 
the Lord; for they rest from their labors, and 
their works do follow them." 



SERMON III. 



OLD AGE. 

tHE RIGHTEOUS SHALL FLOURISH LIKE THE PALM-TREE : HE 
SHALL GROW LIKE A CEDAR IN LEBANON. THOSE THAT 
BE PLANTED IN THE HOUSE OF THE LORD SHALL FLOUR- 
ISH IN THE COURTS OF OUR GOD. THEY SHALL STILL 
BRING FORTH FRUIT IN OLD AGE. — Psalm Xcii. 12-14. 

Among my hearers are many who have passed 
or are passing the meridian of Hfe, and of those 
still young almost all look forward to length of 
days upon earth. I would now address those 
who feel that they are growing old, or who hope 
to become old, and would offer them such comi- 
sels as may save them from the misery of a bar- 
ren and hopeless age, and make them like those 
cedars of Lebanon, around which generations, 
states, empires, have been born and have passed 
away, and which still clothe themselves with the 
verdure and the fruit of their youth. 

We are accustomed to think of the prospect of 
death as full of the most solemn and sad interest. 

3* 



30 OLD AGE. 

It seems to me that the prospect of a lengthened 
life upon earth may well awaken even a deeper 
seriousness and pensiveness of spirit. And in 
saying this, I cast no reproach on the Creator or 
his world. I regard both the old age and the 
death which God means for us, and for which his 
spirit ripens us, as blessed and desirable. But 
old age, where the youth and prime have been 
passed in frivolity or worldliness, and death, 
where God has not been owned in the life, can- 
not be regarded with excessive dread, or warded 
off with a diligence too early or too constant. 
Let us now look at some of these inevitable ex- 
periences of advancing years, which evince the 
need of some principle of greenness and vitality 
beyond the power of time or of earthly change. 

In the first place, if we live long, we must out- 
live the keen enjoyment of mere pleasure, — of 
the lighter and gayer portions of life. While the 
elasticity of youth lasts, before the freshness is 
worn off from scenes and objects that early grow 
familiar, before care presses heavily, or sorrow 
teaches its first hard lessons, one derives con- 
scious gladness from the round of amusement, 
from whatever wears a festive aspect, from song, 
laughter, and merriment. But before the noon 
of life, most persons find these things becoming 
burdensome. They cannot raise their spirits to 
so high a level. Growing responsibilities have 
subdued their former buoyancy of soul. Afflic- 



OLD AGE. 31 

tion, while, so far from deadening, it has only 
rendered the more intense the capacity for calm 
and sober enjoyment, has infused a lasting pen- 
siveness, with which loud and gay music makes 
a repulsive discord. The feeling rapidly grows 
upon one, that the game of life is too doubtful, 
and its stakes too desperate, for trifling ; and 
many of the voices, much of the laughter, which 
used to make him glad, and on which in early 
life his free soul could float forth in entire sym- 
pathy, have become as vapid as the crackling of 
thorns. Those who still retain the livery of youth 
for the most part find it irksome, and deem it a 
galling necessity, an incessant burden and weari- 
ness, to continue in the routine in which they 
once found their chief pleasure. 

With regard to the more serious pursuits of 
life, a man very early ascertains and exhausts 
the capacities of his condition, knows all that he 
is likely to be and do, and sees but little unat- 
tained for which he can reasonably hope. Before 
middle life, most persons have found their own 
level and their own measure. They have ex- 
hausted the charm of novelty in their profession 
or avocation, and yet feel that any essential 
change in their mode of life is growing more and 
more improbable. They have already abandoned 
many of the aims and hopes with which they 
started on their career, — expect only a compe- 
tence instead of wealth, or mere mediocrity in- 



32 OLD AGE. 

stead of eminence. Golden visions have grown 
dim, wide and far-reaching prospects have been 
narrowed, and the horizon is fast shutting in on 
every side. Then, too, whatever rewards of en- 
terprise or effort have been won appear, when 
attained, but slight and small, compared with 
what they were in expectation. What would 
once have been deemed an ample estate, when 
possessed, seems paltry. The station which was 
once a goal almost too distant to be striven for, 
when reached, dissatisfies ; for some envied Mor- 
decai holds a higher seat. Even in the generous 
and ennobling walks of mental culture, a con- 
viction of our own ignorance grows upon us with 
our growth in wisdom, and the proportions and 
dimensions of truth enlarge to our view faster 
than its details reveal themselves to us. In point 
of mental acumen and vigor, too, there must 
come a period of decline and stagnation ; at 
least, there have been no exempts from this law, 
except where a devout and loving heart has em- 
balmed the intellect in its freshness, and kept the 
old man young. Then how eagerly do younger 
men remind their seniors that they are growing 
old ! Crowding close upon one another's heels, 
the generations rush on, and each thrusts itself, 
with irreverent haste, into the place of that which 
preceded it, saying, — " Stand aside, and give us 
room ; for we were born under better stars, and 
are more abundantly the children of light and 



OLD AGE. 33 

wisdom than ye." The foremost places in soci- 
ety, tlie commanding posts in public life, are con- 
stantly usurped by younger and still younger 
claimants, so that instead of the fathers are the 
children and the children's children. 

Then, again, though the domestic life of tlie 
aged is often serene and happy, it is made so only 
by the hallowing power of a higher world ; for, 
in an eartlily point of view, it is but little that 
we can promise ourselves in declining years as 
to our social and domestic relations. If we live 
long, tliere will drop away from our circle one af- 
ter another of those who seemed essential to our 
very being ; and we must be left as solitary bar- 
ren trunks, or with here and there a decaying 
branch, in place of the green and verdant boughs 
that now seem so full of promise. If we live 
long, it will be to survive a thousand deaths, — 
to see those that started with us gradually wast- 
ing away ; nay, more, to have tliose that still re- 
main, and are inexpressibly dear, far or often di- 
vided from us, — to be oppressed with numberless 
anxieties on their account, to have their burdens 
and sorrows added to our own, and perhaps to 
incur the keenest disappointment in the moral 
delinquency, the bligliting and spiritual death, of 
the once innocent and lovely. 

In fine, waning life must continually part with 
outward advantages Avliich early years had given. 
Decrease as to all things earthly is the inevitable 



34 OLD AGE. 

law of man's latter days. We must have less and 
less in prospect, must have our strongest holds 
upon life one by one broken off, and, beyond 
a certain point, can hope only for days whose 
strength is labor and sorrow. And now take the 
only view which can present itself to the old man 
who has no interest in things above, no hope be- 
yond the grave, and who already feels in his own 
frame that the evil days are drawing nigh and 
the pleasureless years are at hand. What lies 
before him ? A prospect, every feature of which 
is worn and faded, and beyond which rises a black, 
impenetrable wall, — a heritage almost squan- 
dered, and with no reversion for his benefit, — a 
future, an eternity blank and void. And are 
you willing to see life thus slipping away from 
you, and to know that what is gone is irretriev- 
ably gone, and yet to have no hold on a higher 
and better life ? But there is only one Master 
who remains faithful to the hoary head, and '' for- 
sakes not his servant when his strength faileth 
him." Let us look, then, at some of those things 
which we shall need for our happiness, under the 
full consciousness of declining years. 

In the first place, we must feel that we have 
lived for some worthy purpose, accomplished some 
satisfying and permanent results, laid up some 
treasure tliat cannot be taken from us. The 
work of life must have been such, that we can 
regard it with pleasure in our lonely and our sol- 



OLD AGE. 35 

emn hours. It must be such as will abide, and 
go with us from tlie busy scene, and go with us, 
too, from the life that now is. We must see the 
work within in chastened affections, pure tastes, 
a heavenly temper, a heart familiar in its converse 
with God and at peace with man. Our choicest 
possessions must be those which retreating health 
and strength cannot bear with them, or the fail- 
ure of our active intellectual powers destroy, or 
treacherous memory hide from us. And here we 
may trace a beautiful arrangement of divine mer- 
cy, and a pledge, too, that the moral nature shall 
survive the grave, in the fact, that, when the 
sight grows dim through age, and energy is pal- 
sied, and recollection fails, the moral traits gen- 
erally remain unobscured, nay, grow in mellow- 
ness and beauty even to the confines of eternity. 
A friend once gave me an account of his father, 
since deceased, who had then added seven to a 
full century of years. His communion with the 
outward world had at that time entirely ceased, 
except when objects were for a moment, and ^vith 
the utmost effort, forced upon his attention. But 
having been from his youth up gentle, contented, 
happy, and devout, he still manifested the ut- 
most cheerfulness, patience, and gratitude ; his 
lips were moving, the greater part of his waking 
hours, in the language of half-uttered prayer ; and 
the only form of conversation that he had retained 
was that of a fervent benediction, whenever the 



36 OLD AGE. 

voices of his children or friends could pierce the 
thick walls of sense that shut in the soul of the 
blind and deaf old man. Who can doubt tliat 
such a soul has that within it which keeps it in 
perfect peace and gladness, — that it is cheered 
in its solitude by celestial visitors, by the com- 
munings of God, and Jesus, and justified spirits, 
even as the lone mountain, inaccessible to the 
steps of mortals, has the nearest view of heaven ? 
Let us walk with God now, — and then, should 
the days come when we can no longer walk with 
men, we shall still retain our hidden life with 
him ; and in hoary winter, when the harvest of 
our earthly life has passed, and its sheaves are 
all gathered in, the fruits of piety shall still be 
ripening for a better harvest in heaven. 

Again, would we enjoy a happy old age, let us 
make kindness and love the law of our lips and 
our lives. Let us bind ourselves by ties of mu- 
tual benefit with as many of our fellow-beings as 
we may. Let us not have lived in vain for those 
among whom we dwell ; but let us so order our 
lives, that the eye that sees us shall bless us, and 
the ear that hears us shall bear witness for us. 
Selfishness withers the heart prematurely, and 
makes a young man old, while a kind and benefi- 
cent life keeps the heart young, and makes old 
age flourish like a palm-tree. Generous age is 
deserted neither by God nor by man. Its own 
kindred and coevals may grow few ; but stran- 



OLD AGE. 37 

gers perform the part of kindred, and youth de- 
lights to blend its morning beams with the rich 
sunset of a benevolent life. Gratitude and affec- 
tion smooth the tottering steps, and lighten the 
infirmities, of the merciful man. God and all 
good angels are with him. The fruits of his char- 
ity in part remain to refresh and nourish him till 
his change comes, while those not to be found on 
earth are garnered for him in heaven. 

Again, would we pass a happy old age, let 
us not forsake the communion of our departed 
friends. If we live on, their number must soon 
equal, and then exceed, that of the surviving. 
However assiduous and tender may be the minis- 
try of newer and younger friends, there will still 
be vacant places near and about us, which they 
can never fill. The nearest places may be made 
void, and others can* then move around us only 
in an outer circle. Let us learn, therefore, of 
the spirit of Jesus to regard those who have gone 
as still near and with us, as separated from us 
but by a thin veil, which faith may make transpar- 
ent, and as forming a goodly company to welcome 
us to our final rest, and to shed over the majestic 
courts of heaven a familiar, homelike aspect. 

Let us, my friends, by these Christian means 
of preparation, fortify ourselves against the years 
of decline and infirmity. Let us not hope for 
length of days, without making the gift worth 
praying for and worth having. 



38 OLD AGE. 

Let me, in conclusion, commend the train of 
thought in the preceding discourse to the diUgent 
heed of the young who may have listened to me. 
You will all think early of some provision for the 
comfort and happiness of old age. The best pro- 
vision for your latter days, — that without which 
hoarded wealth will be a weary burden, — that 
with which poverty will be no curse, — is tlie 
provision which memory may furnish, — the ret- 
rospect of a life of piety, integrity, and kindness. 
You see those whose early lives were given to 
worldliness or profligacy ; and there surely is not 
in their ranks an advanced post which you could 
think of occupying without a shudder. But how 
beautiful, how reverend, the hoary head which 
crowns a pure and virtuous youth and prime ! 
This world presents no sight so heavenly as the 
serene sunset of a well-spent* life, when the testi- 
mony of a good conscience is loud and clear, — 
when the eye can glance back on duties faithful- 
ly performed and conflicts well sustained, — when 
the veteran soldier of the cross can say, in godly 
sincerity, — '' I have fought a good fight, I have 
finished my course, I have kept the faith." He 
may have borne severe trial and desolating sor- 
row. He may be left alone by those once his 
best beloved. He may seem to have been a mark 
for the keenest shafts of adversity. But he is 
still calm and happy. His repose is on the bosom 
of eternal Love. His peace is that which Jesus 



OLD AGE. 39 

gives, and which the world cannot take awaj. 
How gently blend for him the visions of memory 
and hope ! How tranquil and kind is nature's 
decay ! For him the evening shadows fall gen- 
tly, and they all " point to the dawn." For him 
the silver cord is softly loosed, not cut ; the gold- 
en bowl crumbled, not rudely broken at the foun- 
tain ; and death at length is greeted with a sol- 
emn welcome, as bearing the faithful servant to 
that better home, where, in the beautiful lan- 
guage of the prophet, " they that wait upon the 
Lord shall renew their strength ; they shall 
mount up on wings as eagles ; they shall run and 
not be weary, they shall walk and not faint." 



SERMON lY. 



A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 

{Preached on the day of Public Thanksgiving, 1843.) 

I'HOU SHALT REMEMBER ALL THE WAY WHICH THE LORD 
THY GOD LED THEE Deilt. viii. 2. 

This is emphatically a day of remembrance. 
Parted families meet, and recount the course of 
Providence since they were last together. The 
long absent return, each to bear testimony to 
heavenly guidance and protection. Griefs, too, 
come up with vividness, and wounds are reopened. 
Vacant places at the festival dim the eye of the 
bereaved, and thoughts of those no longer with 
us mingle deep hues of pensiveness with the 
gayety and gladness of the season. What can be 
more appropriate, at once to hallow the joy and 
to soothe tlie sad remembrances of our festival, 
than for us to do together what will be done sep- 
arately in every house, (Heaven grant that it be 
religiously done !) — namely, to look back upon 



A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 41 

the way in which the Lord our God has led us, 
and to recall some of the grateful views of a kind 
Providence which are or ought to be common to 
us all? 

The monuments of divine love are crowded so 
closely together, that we are prone to pass them 
by unnoticed. The experience of all of us is so 
much alike, that we cease to marvel at it. The 
Lord our God leads us all in a way so wonderful 
and so merciful, that it seems a worn and com- 
mon path, with nothing upon it to excite our 
special interest. Were any one of us the sole re- 
cipient of favors of which we all partake, that in- 
dividual would stand forth as a miracle of mercy 
to himself and to every one else, and would be 
regarded, day by day, with the same amazement 
with which the sisters of Bethany saw Lazarus 
stepping forth from the tomb. But because the 
Father of all leaves none unblessed, we often 
neglect the religious review of his Providence, so 
that this duty, than which there is none more 
imperative or more sanctifying, is, perhaps, one 
of the rarest to be faithfully discharged. 

In helping you in the performance of this duty, 
I would first ask you to reflect on the amount of 
happiness which you as an assembly represent. 
You have come hither from more than a hundred 
different dwellings ; and in those dwellings a very 
few are left at home on account of the chronic 
infirmities and gentle decline of age, and one or 

4* 



42 A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 

two laboring under more acute disease, but not 
one so ill as to be incapable of enjoying many of 
the common bounties of Providence, — not one 
to whom this day will not have given a very con- 
siderable preponderance of enjoyment over suf- 
fering. Of those here, how few have come with 
anxious or grief-worn countenances, or with sad 
hearts ! The hue of health, the glow of cheerful- 
ness, is on almost every face. True, there are 
many of you who have chronic troubles, — dis- 
appointments and sorrows, which you do not re- 
gard, and probably never will regard, as healed. 
But these take much less than at first thought 
might seem from the enjoyment of life. Proba- 
bly those who feel the poorest are those of you 
who are only less rich than you once were, 
who have met with great losses, yet have never 
lacked fitting food, raiment, and shelter, or even 
the comforts and luxuries which you enjoyed 
when you called yourselves richer. Your con- 
sciousness of poverty, therefore, is by no means 
constant, but comes to you only at moments when 
you are forced to compare yourselves with oth- 
ers, and casts no cloud over the better portion 
of your lives. Those of you who have been be- 
reaved of kindred nearest to your hearts are, in- 
deed, mourners every day. But still there are 
so many of the beloved left, and so many sources 
of joy still open, that your moments of poig- 
nant grief bear a small proportion to the gladness 



A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 43 

which a kind Providence forces upon you in spite 
of the sorrow that you so carefully nourish. It 
is not that your hearts are ever unfaithful to the 
memory of those that are gone ; but your joy- 
giving Father will not leave his children a prey 
to enduring grief. There is probably not one of 
you to whom, in the sight of God, this is not a 
happy day ; not one, whose glad do not outnum- 
ber his regretful thoughts ; whose mercies spared 
do not exceed those withdrawn, by a proportion 
beyond our power to calculate ; — for our sor- 
rows we can count, and tell our wounds, but thy 
thoughts of love, God, how great is the sum of 
them ! — should we count them, they are more 
in number than the sands of the sea. 

How many sources of happiness flow for us 
this morning! While we slept, the stars faded 
from their night-watches, and the misty dawn 
prepared a softened, mellow light for our waking 
eyes. The sun rose in beauty on our day of glad 
festivity. The autumn air has breathed health 
and vigor into our frames. The rich, yet chas- 
tened, hues of the autumn sky have sent their 
spirit of repose into our hearts. The notes of the 
dying year reach us, not as those of a dirge, but 
as an anthem of praise and hope. When the 
night-curtain was uplifted, we came forth from 
our rest to the tables which our Father had 
spread for us ; and the table of the poorest of us 
bore testimony to his blessing on commerce and 



44 A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 

on harvest toil, on skill and handicraft. We met 
in our respective families. No watch had we 
kept by night, but we feared no evil ; we aban- 
doned ourselves and one another to the unslum- 
bering Shepherd of Israel. Yet danger may have 
been near. The shadow of death may have passed 
over our dwellings ; but God averted it before 
we waked to fear it. There were in our houses 
numerous frail infant lives, which might be 
crushed before the moth, and the sparing of which 
through so many gates of death seems an un- 
ceasing miracle ; yet they slept unharmed, and 
awoke full of health and gladness, for they rested 
under the good Shepherd's eye, and beneath his 
arm. 

Home, — how many springs of joy does that one 
word comprise ! It is created by the very events 
which we most dread within its enclosure. It is 
the offspring of sickness, suffering, and death. 
It is our exposure to these (so called) calamities, 
which makes it necessary for each to have that 
retreat, that ark of protection, where others shall 
help him ward off the evil day, or bear and sur- 
vive it when it comes. It is death that calls for 
successive generations of men, and creates fami- 
lies for the nourishment and defence of each new 
race. Take suffering and death away, and man- 
kind would be at once resolved into isolated 
units, and the shrine of the purest joy would be 
laid waste and desolate for ever. Yet how kindly 



A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 45 

are these essential portions of the beneficent sys- 
tem arranged, so that they often darken not for 
years the home that they make glad, and, when 
they come, come almost always with gentle prep- 
aration, and with unexpected sources of relief 
and comfort ! How much is implied in the tran- 
quil and healthful condition in which most of our 
families have found themselves to-day ! So many 
living lyres in time and tune, so many marvelibus 
tides of life kept flowing, — and yet these lyres 
strung as with threads of gossamer, these tides 
flowing in the frailest vessels, and liable to be 
shed by the slightest accident. In a thousand 
forms and ways must an incessant Providence 
watch, guard, and guide, avert peril and bestow 
aid, in each of our households, with every new 
day, to make health the rule, disease and death 
tlie rare exception, — joy the current, grief the 
transient ripple on its surface. 

I have spoken of common blessings. Have we 
not each special mercies which we would own 
with devout gratitude, — mercies adapted to our 
peculiar wants, stamped and sealed as for us indi- 
vidually, as distinctly marked, so to speak, with 
our names, as keepsakes from a friend might be ? 
How often have we received the very favors which 
we most needed, yet foresaw not, and dared not 
anticipate, sent at the only moment and in the 
only mode in which they could have been avail- 
ing ! How many way-marks have we had reason 



46 A PKOTECTING PROVIDENCE. 

to set up all along the path of life for peculiar 
interpositions and deliverances, for the hand of 
love outstretched at our seasons of greatest need, 
for those blessings so exactly timed, that, sent 
sooner, they would have been useless, or, given 
later, they would have come too late ! Often, too, 
have slight events become the parents of great ; 
and conjunctures of trivial circumstances have 
seemed to sway the whole course of our destinies. 
Often has our entire future appeared to hang as 
on a single thread, and to be modified as by the 
turning of a straw. Thus has God, by the feeble- 
ness of second causes, laid bare his own guiding 
arm, and shown liimself the gracious arbiter of 
our fortunes. At times, too, the path has seemed 
shut up against us, mountains of difficulty have 
obstructed our way, or we have been, as were the 
Israelites of old, with foes behind and the deep 
sea before them. But just as we have halted in 
despair, not knowing where to plant our next 
footstep, God has cleft the mountain, or made 
the sea to stand in heaps on either hand, thus 
opening a straight path before us, and giving us 
the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness. 

In the way in which the Lord our God has led 
us, we may also cherish our gratitude by mark- 
ing the footsteps of things that have almost hap- 
pened. How close have we all often come to 
trial, suffering, or death, which Providence has 
averted when just hanging over our heads ! The 



A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 47 

shadow darkens on our path ; but the hand of 
love rolls it back before we feel its gloom. The 
safe way, by which we have been led, is a narrow 
road, often on the brink of fearful precipices, and 
crossing chasms and abysses as by a single plank. 
The slightest misstep to the right hand or to the 
left, and we are lost. Yet, amid liidden pitfalls 
and lurking graves, God has kept our feet from 
falling, and our souls from death. 

In this connection, it is well for us to consider 
how little we can do for ourselves. We are too 
prone to feel as if our own industry, energy, and 
forethought could accomplish much. We are 
apt to take credit to ourselves for the security in 
which we dwell, and for the comforts which we 
multiply around us. But think how many sources 
of joy must all flow together, how many depart- 
ments of nature and of being must all be brought 
into harmony, in order for us to pass a single 
hour in comfort. Is this, my hearer, an hour of 
peace and happiness ? Are yoti sound in body, 
free from pain and infirmity, without any heavy 
burden on your mind, any outward source of 
grief, or any secret sorrow preying on your heart ? 
If so, you may count the stars in the sky more 
easily than you can number the blessings of this 
moment. Your complex frame, consisting of myr- 
iads of parts, demands nutriment from every ele- 
ment, levies contributions on all surrounding na- 
ture, and pines and suffers the instant its claims 



48 A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 

are denied. Your mind takes simultaneous cog- 
nizance of a Tast variety of objects and topics, 
and is thus constantly open at all points to anxi- 
ety and corroding care. Your heart interweaves 
its fibres, not only with a cherished few, but, 
more or less closely, with a great number of rel- 
atives, intimates, or dependents, whose lives are 
bound up in the same bundle with your own, 
whose griefs you bear, whose sorrows you carry, 
who can none of them be in immediate and deep 
distress, and leave you at your ease. But though 
you depend on all these things, you can yourself 
do but one thing at a time ; and, while seeking 
your own good in one direction, you are obliged 
to leave all your other interests uncared for, all 
the other avenues to your peace unguarded. 
Your own counsel and might cannot be instru- 
mental in doing for you a millionth part of what 
is every moment done for you. How deep, then, 
should be the gratitude with which you now set 
up a new pillar of thanksgiving, with the inscrip- 
tion, — " Hitherto hath the Lord helped me ! " 

We have thus taken, under a few obvious, yet 
too much forgotten heads, a cursory view of the 
way in which the Lord our God has led us. 
What are the duties to which this review calls 
us ? 

Does it not make the gratitude of the most 
thankful seem cold ? What but unceasing praise 
can worthily respond to this incessant flow of 



A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 49 

mercy ? And yet, my friends, do not some of us 
live without thanksgiving, — receiving unnum- 
bered benefits, and yet never rendering the sacri- 
fice of praise, — with mercies ever new compass- 
ing their path and their lying down, and yet their 
way unblessed, their rest unsanctified, by the in- 
cense of a grateful heart ? that every soul 
might feel the love in which it is embosomed, 
and might send heavenward the blended anthem 
of all its powers and afiections, — " Bless the 
Lord, and forget not all his benefits ! " May 
the smile of our Father rest upon us, and sink 
deep into our hearts, as we enjoy the festivities of 
this day. With those that we love best at our 
sides, in homes made happy, at tables spread by 
our Father's bounty, may the rich gifts lead us to 
the Giver, and may every fireside and every heart 
be an altar of praise. 

In these mercies, hear we not also the voice of 
religious exhortation, — " My son, give me thy 
heart " ? Why is it that our outward life is thus 
passed as in the bosom of the Infinite Father, if 
it be not that our souls may also live in him ? 
From our happy homes and our bountiful boards, 
from the children, like olive-plants, around our 
tables, from the uncounted blessings that encom- 
pass our daily path, from the watchful love that 
guards our nightly rest, come there not invita- 
tions, loud and many-voiced, to consecrate our 
lives to Him who loves us aU, and whose tender 



50 A PROTECTING PROVIDENCE. 

mercies are over all his works ? And shall not 
these voices of Providence blend in beautiful har- 
mony with that of Him who bore upon earth, 
and displayed among the dwellings of men, the 
image of the Father's love ? 

God's providence in all the past invites and 
exhorts us to implicit trust in him for all time to 
come. In our httleness and lowliness, we may 
feel that we are individually the objects of the 
Divine interest, care, and love ; that " he knoweth 
our path and our lying down, and is acquainted 
with all our ways." We may dismiss care ; for 
he careth for us. We may repose even on the 
mountain billows ; for " the Lord on high is 
mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, 
than the mighty waves of the sea." We need 
never apprehend for the morrow, or cast looks of 
doubt or fear along the path of life ; for we are 
assured that the pillar of cloud will shield us by 
day, and the fire-signal guide us by night. 



SERMON y. 



DESPONDENCY. 

WHY ART THOU CAST DOWN, O MY SOUL ? AND WHY ART THOU 
DISQUIETED IN MB? HOPE THOU IN GOD. Psalm xlii. 5. 

The lesson of implicit trust in Providence is, 
even to many who call themselves Christians, 
hard to learn, and easy to forget. Some of us 
habitually, and most of us at times, cherish a 
foreboding spirit with reference to the future, 
and afflict ourselves with the evils and calamities 
that may come. In our text the Psalmist rebukes 
himself for this anxious, distrustful spirit, and, 
in a season of doubt and disquietude, urges upon 
his own soul the exhortation, — " Hope thou in 
God." The text will suggest the division of my 
sermon. I would first illustrate the unreason- 
ableness and virtual impiety of the over-anxious, 
foreboding spirit manifested by so many, and 
would then inculcate the lesson of implicit trust 
in a wise and paternal Providence. 

Do I address any of the foreboding and dis- 



52 DESPONDENCY. 

trustful ? I would first remind you that this spir- 
it is rebuked by your whole experience. The vast 
preponderance with you has always been on the 
side of happiness. You have probably never 
passed an utterly wretched day, — a day which 
did not give you more enjoyment than suffering. 
If you have been long of this foreboding habit, 
not one in a hundred . of the sorrows that you 
have apprehended has reached you. Those, also, 
that have overtaken you have been lighter than 
you would have feared. The stone may have 
been great, and as you drew near, you said, — 
" Who will roll it away ? " But an angel's hand 
has helped you lift it. Why should you look for 
darker days than you have passed through ? Why 
should you expect a more afflictive experience 
than you have had ? Why do you fear that the 
goodness and mercy which have followed you all 
your days will forsake you now ? Do troubles 
seem close at hand and inevitable ? So have 
they seemed before, and yet a way of escape has 
been opened. We have all of us been as was 
Isaac on Mount Moriah. The sacrifice has been 
ready, the knife lifted, and ourselves the victims ; 
but, as the stroke descended, an unseen hand 
turned it from us. " The thing that hath been 
shall be." The Divine presence, which in cloud 
and fire has guided your path thus far, shall be 
your guide even unto death. 

Again, what can your anxiety do for you ? 



DESPONDENCY. 53 

Can it avert what you dread ? No. But it may 
hasten it. Under Providence, there are many 
evils which it is within our own power to ward off. 
In many respects, our health, our outward well- 
being, and that of our households, are committed 
to our own keeping, and can be safely kept only 
by a self-collected mind and a quiet heart. But 
the foreboding, desponding spirit is apt to be 
thrown off its guard ; it loses the just balance and 
healthy tone of its mental powers ; it becomes in- 
capable of forethought, and rushes headlong into 
the evil which it fears, or remains in tlie track of 
calamities which, if in a more tranquil state, it 
would foresee and escape. Then, too, your solici- 
tude, even where it cannot hasten, cannot prevent 
trial ; and if the dreaded evil comes, your pre- 
\dous anxiety will have weakened the fortitude 
with which you might otherwise have borne it 
and triumphed over it, and will give it the vic- 
tory over you in a conflict, in which it is your 
Father's will that you should come off more than 
conqueror. 

I would also remind you that sorrow in pros- 
pect is much more bitter and grievous than it is 
in actual experience. When it comes to us as 
the cup which our Father gives us, it comes ready 
mingled, and mingled with elements of relief 
and comfort. God sends no unmitigated sorrow ; 
but always enables us to sing of mercy in the 
midst of judgment, — never suffers us in the 

5* 



54 DESPONDENCY. 

spirit of heaviness utterly to cast off the garment 
of praise. He smooths for us the descent into the 
vale of tribulation ; and we go down into it laden 
with covenant mercies, and with the assurance, 
— "I will never leave nor forsake thee.'^ Every 
trial comes with its alleviating circumstances, its 
mild preparatives, and abounding consolations. 
Sickness summons sympathy and patience for its 
ministers. Unmerited disesteem fortifies itself 
by the testimony of a good conscience. Poverty 
moves on under the guidance of health and hope. 
Bereaved affection meets the risen Saviour at the 
grave-side. In every form of sorrow, God draws 
near to the stricken spirit, and offers his own joy- 
giving presence in the place of the blessings taken ; 
and many of the afflicted have had in their sever- 
est trials far deeper, more heart-swelling views of 
the Divine love than they ever had in their sea- 
sons of gayety and gladness. But if we borrow 
trouble, we seize the cup in its untempered bit- 
terness, before the time has come for the infusion 
of what may sweeten, bless, and sanctify it. 

But there are some who are perpetually dread- 
ing for themselves calamities, whicii they say they 
would not fear so much for others ; but such is 
their lot, — they are the doomed ones, — they are 
marks for the shafts of adversity, — the cup may 
pass from others, but not from them. Have I a 
hearer who cherishes such feelhigs ? If so, I 
would ask him. Do you deem God partial, as 



DESPONDENCY. 55 

man is partial ? Do you believe that he will send 
you one trial more than you need ? And if you 
really have more trials than others, may they not 
be sent in part to break up your habit of com- 
plaining and foreboding, to lead you to a calm 
and quiet self-commitment to the Divine protec- 
tion, and to fix in your heart the spirit of cheer- 
ful confidence ? 

Let me again ask those who permit themselves 
to cast fearful and gloomy looks into the future, 
Why do you dread aught that can befall you, 
when none of these things can take place without 
your Father ? You must feel assured that under 
him all things will work together for your good. 
You are as little children under his guidance ; 
and to your short sight there may be deep mys- 
teries in many of his dispensations, as there al- 
ways are to a child in the course of discipline 
chosen by a judicious earthly parent. Lean, then, 
as children upon his arm, and commit yourselves 
as children to his keeping. Let him lead you in 
a way which you know not. Say with the Psalm- 
ist, — " I will fear no evil, for thou art with me." 
Make yourselves, so far as may be, independent 
of outward calamity. Seek those treasures of the 
inner man, that property of the mind and the af- 
fections, which can be neither frittered away by 
change nor destroyed by death. Let your true 
life be that hidden life of the heart, which is 
" most vigorous when the body dies." Let your 



56 DESPONDENCY. 

souls be renewed by the transforming power oi 
your Saviour's spirit, and then shall no outward 
trouble have power to harm you. 

" The man resolved and steady to his trast, 
Inflexible to ill and firmly just, 
Should the whole frame of nature round him break, 
In ruin dire and wild confusion hurled, 
He unconcerned would meet the mighty wreck, 
And stand secure amidst a falling world." 

I have thus spoken of the folly and the rem' 
edy of a disquieted and foreboding spirit. Let 
me now urge upon you, and upon my own soul, 
the Psalmist's self-exhortation, — " Hope thou in 
God." An unexplored future is before us. There 
hangs over it a veil, which no hand can lift, and 
behind which no eye can look. But, as Chris- 
tians, we have every possible ground for trust 
and hope ; for that unexplored future is in the 
hands of our Father. And in saying this, consid- 
er how much we imply, — a providence minute, 
perfect, constant, — a care for us individually, 
extending itself to our least interests and wants, 

— an unslumbering watchfulness for our good, 

— a particular adaptation of whatever befalls us 
to our true and highest welfare. This doctrine 
of a minute paternal Providence is often on our 
lips, and were we assured that it is false, I doubt 
whether one of us would be willing to incur the 
risks and responsibilities even of a prosperous 
life for a moment longer. But who among us 



DESPONDENCY. 57 

gathers from this thought the support and conso- 
lation which it might and should afford ? Who 
feels the slightest insecurity, so far as he can 
have his interests cared for by an earthly parent ? 
Who distrusts the future as to any point in which 
human love can make it blessed and happy ? Yet 
is there not, in many hearts, a vague, undefined, 
latent feeling of insecurity under the Divine gov- 
ernment ? Let us cast out this feeling, as at war 
both with our intellectual belief and with the 
teachings and spirit of Jesus. God is our Father. 
On this one blessed truth let us repose. Here 
let us cast down our cares and drop our bur- 
dens. There is a burden-bearer with us, who faint- 
eth not, neither is weary. Let us suppress the 
thought of murmuring and repining, and say of 
every appointment of Heaven, — "It is the Lord ; 
let him do what seemeth to him good." True, 
like Jacob when he left his father's house, we 
may often have to lie down in desolateness and 
sorrow. Our pillow, like his, may often be a 
hard and a lonely one. But near us, as near 
him, will the mystic ladder be reared, and the 
angels of God descend with blessings for us ; 
faith will set up the bleak and barren rock on 
which we rested for a pillar of thanksgiving; and 
when from the heights of heaven we mark the 
spot, we shall call " the name of the place 
Bethel." 

Again, we have under God one object of hope 



58 DESPONDENCY. 

continually in view, namely, the growth of our 
characters ; and this is the great end for which, 
were we wise, we should desire to live. It is 
not merely in the sanctuary that we find testi- 
mony borne to the truth, that the outward con- 
dition of itself presents no adequate object of 
hope. We see those who bear the heaviest bur- 
dens perfectly happy, — those whose burdens are 
few or none, often wretched. And as to ourselves, 
we cannot but be conscious that our chief need is 
of that inward principle of holiness, that reign 
of God in the heart, which is complete in itself 
without any outward addition. This, we believe, 
is the ultimate purpose of all our Father's dispen- 
sations. Does he send outward favors and mer- 
cies ? It is that gratitude may engrave his image 
on our hearts, and write his law on our lives. 
Does he remove from us cherished blessings ? 
" Every branch that beareth fruit he pruneth, 
that it may bring forth more fruit." He takes 
from us what is not ourselves, that the hidden 
man of the heart may have a more free and rapid 
growth. He takes gifts which we were in danger 
of loving more than the Giver. He takes wealth 
that bound our souls to the sordid pathway which 
he bids us leave. He takes friends, whose un- 
quenched love and undiminished loveliness may 
unite our spirits by new and more intimate bonds 
with the unseen and eternal world. He guides 
us where we dread to go ; but we find, as we 



DESPONDENCY. 59 

move on, new energies of character, new strength 
to do, to bear, and overcome, called forth. He 
leads us through deep waters ; but their baptism 
is that. of the Holy Spirit. His waves and billows 
go over us ; but they bear our souls nearer to 
their true rest. The outward he makes subser- 
vient to the inward, the body to the soul, time to 
eternity. This, then, let us hope without the 
shadow of a doubt, — that, if we are only faith- 
ful, every change, and trial, and cross will make 
us better, will increase that treasure which is 
within and indestructible, will render us more 
and more what in our best moments we wish 
and pray that we may become. 

Finally, heaven and eternity, brought to light 
by Jesus, re-echo the exhortation, — ^' Hope thou 
in God." Have we the testimony of his love 
within ? Are we living by the law and in the 
spirit of Christ ? Have we the consciousness of 
pardoned sin and of souls at peace with God ? If 
so, however heavy our outward burdens or sor- 
rows, we may well ask, in self-rebuke, — " Why 
art thou cast down, my soul ? and why art 
thou disquieted within me ? " How brief the 
longest space which earthly trials can cover ! 
How short the period during which changes can 
come ! How, in comparison with eternity and 
with ever-growing joy, does all that flesh and 
heart can bear, on this side of the grave, shrink 
into utter nothingness ! But this inheritance 



60 DESPONDENCY. 

above is revealed, that faith may use it here, — 
that hope may bridge over the few doubtful years 
that remain with an arch, that shall repose at 
once on a past full of mercy, and a heaven where 
all is sure, cloudless, and eternal. The time is 
indeed short, to some very short. Duty, love, 
faithfulness, these endure for ever, while the 
world passes away, with its desire and its fashion. 
Let us seek those things that are unseen, that 
live through death, that are born, and grow, and 
ripen for eternity. 



SERMON YI. 



THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

LET ME DIE THE BEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS, AND LET MT 

LAST END BE LIKE HIS. — Numbers xxiii. 10. 

These words were wrung from a heart in re- 
bellion against God, and at enmity with his peo- 
ple. Balaam had been sent for to curse Israel, 
and went into the neighborhood where the cove- 
nant people had encamped on their way to the 
promised land, full of malignant passions, and 
prepared to utter railing and imprecation. But 
as he cast his eyes over the nation that God had 
blessed, and saw their tents '' spread forth as gar- 
dens by the rivers, and as cedar-trees beside the 
waters," — as he beheld the marks of their unde- 
caying vigor and prosperity, notwithstanding their 
lengthened wanderings in the desert, — and then, 
as he looked across the Dead Sea to the distant 
hills of the fair land that God had given them, 
the curse died upon his lips in an earnest longing 
for the inheritance upon which they were going 

6 



62 THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

to enter. " that I could yet cast in my lot 
among them ! Let me not remain for ever an 
alien from tlieir God, an outcast from their ranks. 
that my name were written among their tribes, 
that I miglit die the deatli of those whom God 
loves, and that my last days might be like theirs ! '* 
The feeling that thus burst forth from the seer 
of Moab cannot but enter every mind, however 
thoughtless, in witnessing the calm and hopeful 
departure from life of those to whom it was Christ 
to live, and we know that it must be gain to die. 
As we behold them resigned, cheerful, and happy, 
while the death-shadow steals over them, and see 
God's own peace reflected from their counte- 
nances as they draw near the land of promise, 
whatever our lives may have been, we for the 
moment breathe the prayer, — "Let me die the 
deatli of the righteous, and let my last end be 
like his." 

Why is it that the event of death occupies so 
small a space in most men's thoughts and calcu- 
lations, surrounded as they are by its memorials, 
its knell ringing in their ears every week, its sig- 
nal and impressive voices, in the removal of con- 
spicuous and active members of society, succeed- 
ing each other at very brief intervals ? I appre- 
hend that much of the prevalent thoughtlessness 
with reference to death results from the absurd, 
unchristian idea, that preparation for death is 
some tiling entirely distinct from the work of life. 



THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 63 

There are in every Christian community scores 
of people who have no doubt, that, when they are 
about to die, they shall have ample warning, and 
can then, amid the last scenes, hasten through 
certain stereotyped forms of death-bed penitences 
and devotion, which will insure them a passport 
to heaven. And if they know when death is 
near, they will be hurried through these forms, 
they will have everything that Christian assiduity 
can proffer to awaken religious faith and trust, 
they will lay hold with trembling eagerness on 
the merciful words of the Saviour, and will pass 
away with expressions of feeling, to which fond 
and partial friends cannot help giving a hopeful 
interpretation, but on which the observing and 
experienced Christian is constrained to look with 
full as much doubt as hope, apprehending that 
they flow from the diseased action of a feverish 
brain. 

The thought which I wish to inculcate in the 
present discourse is, that a Christian life is the 
only sure ground of hope in death. I would rep- 
resent the work of life and the preparation for 
death as one and the same thing ; and would at- 
tach to every portion of healthful, active, busy 
life the associations of deep solemnity, which are 
commonly grouped around the closing moments 
of one's earthly pilgrimage. Nay, I believe, that, 
could we look at things in the light of eternity, 
the shop, the counting-room, the fireside, the so- 



64 THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

cial party, the scenes of temptation that are scat- 
tered up and down the wayside of life, would 
seem more solemn than the death-chamber ; for it 
is in those that the soul wrestles with death, and 
often falls and dies, while through what we call 
the mortal agony the soul passes unscathed. 

In pursuing my present design, let me first ask 
yoiir attention to an invariable law of our being, 
of which we are too prone to lose sight, namely, 
that our success and happiness in every new con- 
dition of life depend upon our preparation for that 
condition. We continually reap as we sow, and 
are both sowing and reaping every day. Our 
earthly life is made up of a series of states and 
relations, each of which derives its character from 
the next preceding. Thus, " the child 's the 
father of the man." Tlie faults, follies, omis- 
sions, and sins, or the attainments and virtues, of 
youth determine our condition, seal our misery or 
happiness, as men and women. Were our early 
steps in the way of transgressors, " the iniquities 
of our heels compass us about " through life, and 
we cannot escape them. Were we consecrated 
from childhood to God and duty, we still walk in 
our uprightness, and God's peace and blessing 
rest upon our homes and our daily ways. Multi- 
tudes there are who can bear sad and joyful tes- 
timony to the working of this law, — those whom 
sincere repentance has not saved from keen suf- 
ferinff, mortification, and besettino- sin, on the 



THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 65 

score of early delinquencies, — those who bless 
God to the da^ of their death for the virtuous au- 
spices which attended their opening youth. And 
old age, which Uves upon the past, which cannot 
but feed on its remp-mbrances, whether they yield 
the bread of heaven or apples of Sodom, — old 
age is altogether whaf youth and manhood have 
made it. Where can you point to a happy old 
age, where the prime cf life was not marked by 
purity, honesty, diligence, ard usefulness ? Where 
can you find the hoary head bereft of peace and 
hope, where earlier days were pa'^sed m the fear 
of God and on the post of duty ? 

The case is similar with the var'ous relations 
of business, and of domestic and social life. A 
man's success and happiness in his worldly avoca- 
tion depend, as you all know, not on his ad van' 
tages, but on his preparation to use them aright 
Splendid advantages only lead to a splendid fail' 
ure, where they are not connected with previou? 
training and self-discipline. It is not his capital 
that makes the merchant, or his tools the me- 
chanic, or his acres the farmer ; but it is the 
mind, that patiently yields itself to the culture 
and the preliminary trials which create experi- 
ence and skill. 

The same law holds good in domestic life. The 
families in wliicli we are born are our nurseries 
for the families of which we become the heads. 
We are, as husbands, wives, and parents;* what 

6* 



66 THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

we were as children, brothers, and sisters. The 
most felicitous connection cannot make the iin- 
dutiful son a good and happy husband, or the 
frivolous daughter and selfish sister an honored 
wife, or a mother worthy of the name. In so- 
ciety, too, in extended trusts and large responsi- 
bilities, how often are we reminded of the early 
traits of those who have grown up at our side ! 
The little republic of the school or the play- 
ground trains the neighbor, the citizen, the pub- 
lic functionary. Those whom their young com- 
panions trusted and loved, who were the peace- 
makers in the petty quarrels of children, the 
friends of truth and right on tlie humble, yet 
spiritually momentous occasions of our early 
days, are now, for the most part, the true, peace- 
ful, upright, and trustworthy men and women, 
whose virtues adorn and bless the smaller or 
larger circles in which they move. On the other 
hand, the petulant, quarrelsome, untruthful, ill- 
nurtured children, whose influence and example 
were to be deprecated among their schoolmates 
and playmates, are now the talebearers, mischief- 
makers, brawlers, double-dealers, unloving and 
unloved, distrustful and distrusted, in every so- 
cial and public office and relation. 

Now, how is it that men will not apply this 
same law to that future state of being on which 
they hope to enter ? How fail they to perceive 
and understand tliat the heavenly society, like 



THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 67 

every other state of being, needs and demands 
preparation, and that preparation for it cannot be 
a mere formula of holy words mumbled by dying 
lips, but must run through the habits, the feel- 
ings, the affections, the entire character ? Think 
^t, my friend, that a mere name above reproach 
among men, mere honesty and kindness, and a 
reputable walk in your outward relations and 
duties, will suffice for the dying hour. Tlie great 
question is. Where is your heart? What are 
your prevalent tastes and habits of thought ? 
Whence flows your enjoyment? Where rest 
your hopes ? Is your whole soul fixed on things 
outward and earthly ? Is your whole life bound 
up in the world that you must leave ? Are you, 
in the spiritual world, living as an orphan and a 
stranger, — with God, as though he were not, 
without prayer, without the consciousness of his 
venerable presence ? Are your desires and plans 
all earth-bounded, as earth-born ? If so, you 
must acknowledge that you have not within you 
the possible elements of happiness in the life to 
come. With such a character as this, did no 
change take place in you, but only around you, 
were the outward scenes which engross your 
thoughts and aifections swept away, every pleas- 
ure of sense cut off, every form of outward activ- 
ity suspended, and then were the spiritual world 
made clearly manifest, new means of moral growth 
afforded, new avenues of communion with God 



68 THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

opened, the serene heights of virtue and of piety 
made to rise in divine beauty before your sight, 
all this could only render you wretched ; for you 
would lack the preparation of spirit, without 
which these high privileges must remain unen- 
joyed, these lofty attainments unattempted. Yo^ 
must have entered here upon the duties and the 
joys of the spiritual life, in order to make them 
even tolerable to you hereafter. And spiritual- 
ity of thought, temper, and feeling must, in some 
measure, have detached you from earthly objects, 
and made them seem inferior and unessential 
goods, in order for you to resign them without 
intense suffering. If you have not learned to live 
above them, if you have not elements of charac- 
ter which make you independent of them, it will 
be utter misery for you to be parted from them. 

This view demands, as a preparation for death, 
not only a decent formalism, but a strictly spirit- 
ual religion, — a religion which has its seat in the 
affections, its throne in the heart of hearts. Now, 
why are we not all diligently fitting ourselves for 
the home where we hope to go ? Were it some 
distant city or foreign country upon our own 
planet, where we expected to fix our residence, 
how earnestly should we seek an interest in its 
scenes, its resources, and its life ! How eagerly 
should we avail ourselves of every opportunity of 
exercise aftd training in whatever might be pecu- 
liar in its condition and modes of living ! How 



THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 69 

fast, in the interval before embarking, should we 
become, in desire and feeling, citizens of our fu- 
ture home ! And shall the city of God form the 
only exception to this rule ? Shall we turn our 
backs upon it till driven to the shore where we 
must embark, and then go we know not whither? 
Shall not prayer, and faith, and hope lay up treas- 
ures against our arrival thither ? Shall we not 
take in our hands and to our hearts the map of 
the inheritance which God has given us, survey 
its fair proportions, range in thought among its 
many mansions, so that, when we must go, it 
shall be to familiar scenes, to joys already begun, 
to accustomed duties and a long cherished life ? 

Such, surely, is the dictate of right reason. 
And. does the word of God leave us the choice of 
any other ground ? Our relation to the New 
Testament is one of the most solemn import. It 
is in this record that we think we have eternal 
life. This is the charter of our immortality and 
our heavenly citizenship. Take this away, and 
what, where, is our assurance of a life to come, 
— what, where, our hope for ourselves or our de- 
parted friends ? We are all willing, glad, to go 
to it for the words of immortal life. When the 
beloved die, we delight to think of the grave-side 
of Lazarus, and to listen to the voice which the 
realms of silence heard and gave up their dead. 
But if we thus gladly receive, and would not for 
worlds abandon, the hope of heaven, — if we 



70 THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

would shrink with horror from the atheist's icy 
creed, and would rather never have seen the light 
than to have it quenched in utter annihilation, — 
are we not sacredly bound to embrace our Sav- 
iour's doctrine of immortality as a whole, its con- 
ditions no less than its promises ? But the same 
voice that proclaimed that the- dead live for ever 
has also taught, that, " except a man be born 
again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." The 
same hand that led Lazarus from the land of 
shadows back to the home of the living points to 
heaven as destined for those alone who cheerful- 
ly bear the cross, who lay up treasures above, 
who do the will of the Father, and love one an- 
other as he has loved us all. On no other con- 
dition has the New Testament a word of hope or 
promise for us ; nor has Jesus given the slight- 
est ground for confidence or peace as to the fu- 
ture to those who now are willing aliens from 
the life of heaven. If, then, you believe that 
Jesus spake with authority from God, let his 
words as to judgment and eternity rouse you 
from your supineness to do the work of life, and 
enlist all your powers and efforts in the only path 
which can lead you to fulness of joy. 

Thus do the law of human life and the word 
of God, while they make us solicitous to die the 
death of the righteous, unitedly urge upon us the 
essential importance of living his life. The same 
lesson must have impressed itself upon all who 



THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 71 

have been in any degree familiar with the clos- 
ing scenes of life. It is not the opportunity of a 
death-scene, not the hurried and unnatural utter- 
ances of a last hour, but the whole previous char- 
acter, the direction which the face and steps had 
borne before death seemed near, that cherishes 
or crushes our hope for the departed. Of those 
not personally religious, many die and leave no 
sign ; sometimes they are cut down in unwarned 
dissolution ; and when tlie approaching footsteps 
of death are perceived, it often creeps over the 
soul before it chills the limbs, and the patient 
sinks into a lethargic ease and self-complacency, 
from which no appeal can rouse him. Others 
are awakened, alarmed, agitated, pass through a 
paroxysm of fearful agony, emerge from it with 
words of exultation and triumph, and then die 
fearless and happy, with a louder and more elas- 
tic confidence than often falls to the lot of the 
mature and experienced Christian. When this 
unwonted manifestation of feeling comes at the 
close of an innocent, serious, dutiful life, though 
there may have been no previous religious profes- 
sion, it is no doubt frequently to be regarded as 
the rush for utterance, at the last moment, of 
thoughts and emotions which diffidence had pre- 
viously suppressed. But when a careless, world- 
ly, sinful life closes with this spasmodic semblance 
of piety, there is reason to apprehend that the 
utterances of the last hour are unmeaning words, 



72 THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOTTd 

caught up in a state of mental imbecility /rom 
surrounding friends, or copied from tlie remem- 
brance or record of similar scenes, or the result 
of a nervous excitement too strong for the shat^ 
tered body and enfeebled mind to restrain. They 
do, indeed, suggest hope ; for we remember the 
malefactor upon the cross, we think of the over^ 
flowing mercy of our Father, and may thus b© 
led to cherish and offer more encouragement than 
calm reflection would warrant. Biit why, by 
such a death-bed, do we listen so anxiously for 
the last words, and catch so eagerly at whatever 
stimulates the expression of calm and rational 
faith or of filial trust ? Why do friends question 
each other so earnestly as to every word, and look, 
and gesture of the dying ? It is because we 
feel so sensibly the discrepancy between the life 
that is closing and the life of heaven, — because 
the two have nothing in common, but a broad 
and deep gulf lies between them ; and we long 
for something, shadowy though it be, to fill up 
the chasm, — we would bridge the gulf with a 
rainbow, rather than not see it spanned, — we 
will accept almost anything, however vague and 
unsatisfactory in itself, which may go towards 
softening the discrepancy and establishing some 
faint show of connection between the life which 
the dying one has led and that which we hope 
for him. This hanging upon last words indicates 
a latent consciousness that we need and crave 



THE DEATH OF TBi^ Klc^HTEOUS. 73 

some better evidence, — that tne testimony of the 
life alone can satisfy us as regards those that die. 
But there is a life which terminates naturally 
and necessarily in heaven. There sometimes 
pass away from us those whose death-chamber 
seems an ascension-mount, and we can almost 
see them go, so sure we are that they go home 
to God. From them we need no parting words, 

— nay, we sometimes feel glad that no strongly 
marked closing scene intervenes to rival the beau- 
tiful testimony of a holy life, and to distract our 
thoughts from their free range over the succes- 
sive stages of a heavenward pilgrimage. We ask 
not added proof that they are happy. We desire 
not that the closing days should wear a different 
complexion from that of their days of active duty. 
We prefer witnessing till the last moment the 
same blending of social and religious traits and 
affections, which we have seen in them for montlis 
and years. Our best prayer for them is, that 
they may die as they have lived. Should the call 
come suddenly or unperceived by them, there is 
nothing wanting, nothing left to be wrought in a 
hurry and agitation of impending death, no ex- 
piring torch to be trimmed, no wedding garment 
to be sought, and fitted, and hastily thrown on, 
when the king comes in to see the guests. They 
waited not to trim their lamps, till the cry arose, 

— " Behold, he cometli ! " Their robes were long 
since washed white, and made ready for their 

7 



74 THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 

Lord's appearing. Our assurance that they have 
found it gain to die dates back even to early years. 
It flows from a youth redeemed from vanity and 
consecrated to the Most High, — from virtues 
that grew with the growth and strengthened with 
the strength, — from successive occasions and 
posts of duty met and filled with unshrinking 
fidelity, — from years of hallowed effort, example, 
and sacrifice in every relation of domestic life, — 
from kindness, sympathy, and love extended 
throughout the larger circle, from the homes of 
the poor and the hearts of the fatherless, — from 
a walk with God in a manifestly prayerful and 
devout spirit, — from a walk with man, to which 
religion always gave its unction and its glow. 
Wliere but in heaven can such a path have end- 
ed? Where else can such features of spiritual 
life have gone ? What possible doubt, what short 
of a certainty not to be made surer, can rest upon 
their present condition? Their characters were 
of heaven ; their virtues were sucli as have honor 
in the presence of God ; and " the Father seek- 
eth such to worship him." 

Nor can our friends have lost in heaven aught 
of those traits of character which endeared them 
to us here, and which all find room for exercise, 
and for still fuller, loftier development, in that 
better home. Were they true and faithful ? On 
God's holy mount they still " walk uprightly and 
work righteousness." Were they the friends of 



THE DEATH OF THE RIGHTEOUS. 75 

Jesus ? They now " follow the Lamb, whither- 
soever he goeth." "Were they lovely and happy 
in every home relation and duty? They have 
kindred there, whom they have rejoined, — those 
of their earthly home, who have gladly welcomed 
them to the heavenly household. Were they 
known in the dwellings of the poor, and did 
prayers go up for their longer life from stricken 
hearts that had been blessed through their minis- 
try ? There are works of love to Be wrought by 
the redeemed, — divine offices of mercy, for which 
the walks of earthly charity are ordained to train 
and perfect the Christian soul. Did they love 
and keep the commandments of the Most High ? 
Now " he that sitteth upon the throne shall dwell 
among them," and they go no more out from his 
felt presence for ever. 



SERMON VII 



MEMOEY. 

A BOOK OF REMEMBRANCE WAS WRITTEN. — MalacM iii. 16. 

I HAVE taken these words as an appropriate 
motto for a sermon on memory, considered in its 
moral and religious bearings, in its connection 
with critical seasons and emergencies of life, and 
in its relation to God's retributive justice in the 
future world. 

I would first remark, that there is abundant 
reason to believe that memory never loses any- 
thing, but that it retains, and may reproduce, 
when the right string is touched, every thought, 
impression, and event of our whole past lives. 
The well-ascertained phenomena of delirium, in- 
sanity, and other unusual forms of consciousness, 
furnish ample demonstration of this statement. 
In these conditions of mind, it has been found 
that the most minute and remote circumstances, 
complex trains of thought, series of words or 
musical notes, words even in an unknown tongue, 



MEMORY. 77 

have been recalled after an interval of years, and 
flooded the soul with its rememberings. In our 
usual state of mind, things do not indeed return 
to us uncalled, nor yet do they come at once 
when sought, but obey certain laws of sugges- 
tion or association, which retard the action of 
the memory, as the balance-wheel does the move> 
ments of a watch. But in the modes of con^ 
sciousness now referred to, tlie balance-wheel is 
taken off, the usual laws of suggestion are sus- 
pended, the full flow of memory takes the place 
of the scanty jet of recollection, and the whole 
past rushes spontaneously upon the mind, fore- 
shadowing the day when death will snap asunder 
the earth-spun threads of association, and pour 
the accumulated treasures of the past into the lap 
of the boundless future. 

But we need not go beyond our own familiar 
experience to verify this view. Revisit some 
scenes of early life, from wliich you have been 
absent twenty, thirty, or forty years, and what 
intensely vivid remembrances take shape, hue, 
and voice! The faces and tones of the long 
forgotten, the very trees and stones now dis- 
lodged, the prattle and the day-dreams of in- 
fancy, every evanescent frame of thought and 
feeling, will be recalled, and you find yourself 
again a child. There is not a reverie that ever 
flitted across our minds, not a dream that ever 
haunted our pillows, which has gone beyond re- 

7* 



78 MEMORY. 

turn. Nor is there a single day, when strange 
and isolated facts, fragments of conversations, 
vague, floating images of ancient and forgotten 
things, do not thus rise before us, like ghosts 
of the unburied. 

Thus the past never dies, though, in the com- 
mon routine of life, we have to a degree the keys 
of memory in our own hands, and may admit or 
exclude recollections at pleasure. But there are 
seasons, and those not rare, when the keys are 
taken from us, and, without the power of choice, 
we are liable to inundations from the good or 
evil, the sweet or bitter, of the past, promis- 
cuously. Indeed, these seasons are so frequent 
with us all, that a large part of our happiness 
is placed irrevocably out of our own keeping, — 
transferred from our present to our past selves. 
Our unoccupied time, our vacant hours by day, 
our sleepless night-watches, are thus given over 
to the genius of memory ; and whatever there 
may be worthy of regret in the past is then un- 
failingly brought up to arm the passing moments 
with daggers' points, or to plant thorns in our 
pillows. The more harassing the remembrance, 
the more closely it besets us. The visitings of 
any one such phantom may indeed cease, or at 
least its sting may become mollified, after a long ' 
lapse of time, but not till we have exorcised it, 
not only by reiterated repentance, but by entire 
conversion, by the thorough alienation of the 



MEMORY. 79 

temper and the character from what thus gave 
us trouble. And even then, like an old wound 
long healed, which an east wind will fill with 
neuralgic pain, may not this unwelcome remem- 
brance be revived with afflictive power, at in- 
tervals we know not how remote ? 

In seasons of sorrow, the past always utters 
its voices. At such times God brings every work 
into remembrance, and enters into judgment with 
our spirits. When the hand of Providence is 
heavy upon us, if the past has been stained with 
guilt, we need no inscription upon the wall to 
make our knees smite together and our souls 
tremble. The handwriting is upon the fleshly 
tablets of the heart, — " Thou art weighed in the 
balance and found wanting." There is nothing 
more true to universal experience than the self- 
reproaching communings of Joseph's brethren 
when they felt themselves surrounded by im- 
minent perils in a strange land. Their mem- 
ory glided over the long period for which they 
had led self-complacent and generally dutiful 
lives, and rested on the one damning sin of 
former years ; " and they said one to another, 
We are verily guilty concerning our brother, 
in that we saw the anguish of his soul when he 
besought us, and we would not hear ; therefore 
is this distress come upon us." A vast amount 
of remorse mingles with human grief, and drugs 
to the utmost with gall and wormwood the cup 



80 MFM-OPT. 

of sorrow. Wlien ill-gotton and ill-used wealth 
departs, the remembrance of numberless breaches 
of good faith and charity arras penury with a 
scourge of scorpions, which she never wields 
when she enters the dwellings of God's choeen 
ones. When the unfaithful and unlo^dng are 
separated by death, with the sorrows of bereave- 
ment there blend the embittering recollections 
of violated duty, variance, and discord. 

But compare with the sad retrospect which 
Providence forces upon the guilty the rich remi- 
niscences which crowded Job's mind, when health, 
riches, and children were at once taken from him. 
" When the ear heard me, then it blessed me ; 
and when the eye saw me, it gave witness to me ; 
because I delivered the poor that cried, the fa- 
therless, and him that had none to help him. 
The blessing of him that was ready to perish 
came upon me, and I caused the widow's heart 
to sing for joy. I was eyes to the blind, and feet 
was I to the lame. I was a father to the poor.'' 
And with a past so full of consolation in the re- 
view, no wonder that he could break forth in 
those noble words of undoubting faith and hope, 
— "I know that my Redeemer liveth, and will 
stand up at length on the earth ; and though 
with my skin this body be wasted away, yet in 
my flesh shall I see God." 

Most of all, death, as it is passing the book of 
memory over to the register of eternity, rehearses 



MEMORY. 81 

its records in the ear fast closing to the outward 
world. I have often been startled by the keen 
recollection of the fatally sick, the declining, and 
the dying. The mind, as death draws nigh, can- 
not be diverted from the past ; but will scan it 
with the most wakeful, earnest scrutiny, will 
wait for it to utter all its voices, whether of 
approval or of condemnation, and will not resign 
itself in perfect peace, unless the past wear a 
smiling aspect, and be contemplated with a con- 
science that approves much more than it con- 
demns. True, we are saved by hope. Heaven 
is ours, " not for works of righteousness that we 
liave done " ; yet such works are the only seal 
of God's pardon and acceptance that will satisfy 
us in the dying hour. Under the gnawings of 
fatal disease, new work is seldom done, new 
ideas are seldom acquired, new resources sel- 
dom opened. The mind is thus thrown back 
upon its remembered experience, and acts upon 
it with unabated keenness and strength. Then, 
too, in all its consolations and hopes it seeks to 
be supported and confirmed by memory. With 
those who cherish religious sentiments and af- 
fections at the close of life, and who desire to 
fall asleep in Jesus, there is frequently witnessed 
an anxious and painful self-questioning to which 
memory alone can respond. The inquiry is, — 
" Is there nothing unusual, unnatural, in my 
present feelings ? Are they the fruit of true 



82 MEMORY. 

piety towards God ; or are they the mere wan- 
derings of a sickly, dreaming imagination ? " 
This is a question which none can happily an- 
swer, except those who can look back upon days 
of active and healthful piety, and make these 
their term of comparison ; — who can say, — 
" This is indeed no new glow, no strange fire, 
but the same that warmed me for duty and for 
conflict while my health was firm, — the same 
that gave fervor to my daily prayers, burned 
in my soul at the public altar, and inspired 
me for the words of Christian counsel and 
sympathy, and the labors of a willing charity. 
My joy in God, my trust in Jesus, my hope of 
heaven, which now sustain my sinking spirit, 
have been the staff of my life, — I have tested 
their genuineness, I have made full trial of their 
power, I know that they are from the Father, 
and cannot fail me." This, my friends, is no 
fancy sketch. Such questionings I have often 
heard from the perilously sick and the dying. 
They themselves are prone to distrust new-born 
faith and piety. They need memory for a wit- 
ness in their behalf. This testimony a death- 
bed repentance lacks ; and therefore it finds no 
medium between vehement, self-forgetting excite- 
ment and utter despondency. 

But it is asked. Is it within our own power to 
lay up remembrances that will give peace and 
pleasure ? Are not many of the events of life 



MEMORY. 83 

(and some of them such as we can never forget) 
entirely beyond our own agency? May not an 
always frowning Providence, without our fault, 
fill the book of memory with dismal and mourn- 
ful entries ? I answer. No ; for it is not events, 
but our own traits of character and conduct 
alone, that are capable of giving us anguish in 
the remote retrospect. It is astonishing how 
smooth the roughest ways of Providence look 
at a little distance. Sickness, bereavement, dis- 
appointment, though agonizing in their immedi- 
ate pressure, are remembered without torment, 
— nay, if they were submissively borne, their 
place, in the way that we have been led, is 
marked by a pillar of gratitude, with the inscrip- 
tion. Bethel. If shadows gather about our dy- 
ing bed, they will be the shadows of our neg- 
ligences, follies, and sins. But if our lives have 
been faithful, devout, and loving, then will the 
remembrance of what we were through the grace 
of God, and the testimony of a good conscience 
glancing to and fro through the years that are 
gone, give peace and triumph to our departing 
spirits, and enable us to feel that God is tak- 
ing us to a rest for which he had first fitted us. 
These thoughts evince the necessity of laying 
up remembrances for the hour of death. Most 
emphatic are the lessons to this effect which 
have gone forth from the death-beds of those 
that have passed away from our own circle. I 



84 MEMORY. 

have heard the pure and devout regret even 
having read what was unedifying and frivolous ; 
for, said they, " there is hardly an evil or foolish 
thing that has ever met our eyes, however little 
hold we meant to give it upon our minds, that 
does not come back to us now." Nor is it barely 
enough to have an empty conscience, and to look 
back upon a life free from reproach, yet void of 
spiritual good. A merely worldly life cannot 
present a satisfying retrospect from the bed of 
death. We shall then need remembrances of 
duty, virtue, love, and piety. Life must have 
had its work, and must in some good degree 
have fulfilled its mission. There must be a 
past filled with those things by which character 
grows, man is served, and God glorified. A 
recent German writer, in a fictitious sketch, in- 
troduces a worthy youth as compiling a book 
of pleasant experiences to be read for his com- 
fort at the hour of death. Such a book it con- 
cerns us all to write, not on paper, but on the 
surer and more lasting tablet of a memory that 
cannot die. When we lie down to our last sleep, 
let our thoughts, as they must needs run back, 
rest upon a life of fidelity and devotion, upon 
frequent visitings of angels and the felt smile of 
Heaven, upon a growing and deep experience 
of that love of God through Christ Jesus from 
which neither life nor death can divide or alien- 
ate us. 



MEMORY. 85 

I wish now to present the bearing which this 
view of memory has on the doctrine of a future 
righteous retribution. " I saw the dead," says 
St. John, — "I saw the dead, both small and 
great, stand before God. And the books were 
opened, and the dead were judged out of those 
things which were written in the books, accord- 
ing to their works." And out of what books can 
they be thus judged, except those of memory, — 
books written by themselves, but preserved by 
God, and opened at the solemn hour of death for 
their acquittal or condemnation ? If the past is 
thus to be brought to light, may not memory be 
the prime-minister of God's retributive justice, — 
the worm that never dies, the fire that is never 
quenched, in the sinner's soul, — the peace of 
God, that passeth all understanding, to the pure 
and faithful spirit ? Of the power of memory for 
good or evil we have in this life ample experience 
from the torn and scattered leaves of its book, 
with which recollection furnishes us. What an- 
guish can be compared with the remorse that 
gnaws the breast of the betrayer of innocence, — 
of him whose profligacy has brought the gray 
hairs of parents with sorrow to the grave, — of 
him whose every retrospect is rayless and guilt- 
stained ? What more apt type does earth afford 
of heaven, than in the calm and honored decline 
of a faithful and devout life, which consecrated to 
God the dew of its youth and the fulness of its 

8 



86 MEMORY. 

strength, which grew in virtue as in years, which 
ripened steadily for heaven as its summer leaf 
grew sear ? How deep, then, must be the de- 
spair, or how full the joy, of those before whom 
the veil is all rolled away, and every secret or 
forgotten thing, be it good or evil, brought to 
light ! 

Imagine the abandoned sinner full in the pres- 
ence of his God, no sentence passed upon him 
but that which he is constrained to pass upon him- 
self, no fire let loose upon him but that which 
memory can kindle. What is the view upon 
which he cannot close his reluctant sight ? The 
God, whom he now sees to be merciful as well as 
holy, whose very judgment-seat is a throne of 
love, who hides not even from the reprobate and 
hell-doomed the paternal aspects of his character, 
— that God, that Father, he has set at naught, 
neglected, scorned, perhaps blasphemed. Show- 
ers of blessing fell thick on every portion of his 
eartlily pilgrimage, unacknowledged, unheeded. 
Voices of love were daily, hourly, wooing him 
heavenward ; but he has turned a deaf ear to all 
of them. His ingratitude, seen in memory's 
clear hght, seems black as midnight. He turns 
from an insulted God to the company of his 
fellow-spirits. And here memory again torments 
him. It brings up numerous violations of the 
law of justice and of khidness, neglected opportu- 
nities of mercy, successful conflicts of selfishness 



MEMORY. 87 

with brotherly love. He is in the midst of the 
injured and the outraged, and knows not where 
to look for sympathy and love. Memory thus 
isolates him, makes him both afraid and ashamed 
to trust either God or man, bids him dread the 
frown of the Almighty and shrink from the scorn 
of his brethren. Apply to this quiet outline the 
several degrees of coloring which belong to the 
different shades of human guilt, and though I say 
not that this is all, have you not even here a hell, 
in which the workers of iniquity cannot fail to 
receive according to their works ? 

Pass now to the right hand of the Judge. 
Contemplate a truly humble, devout, exemplary 
Christian, witli the holy thoughts and good deeds 
of a long life of piety spread out before him, not 
veiled, as they were on earth, by the self-abase- 
ment of a lowly spirit, but sparkling in heaven's 
pure sunlight, seen of angels, owned by the be- 
nignant Redeemer, approved by God, the Judge 
of all. Moreover, as his earthly life is thus re- 
viewed in heaven, he sees not only each act itself, 
but its happy, glorious, perhaps still widening and 
brightening results. Did he sow a seed of hum- 
ble charity ? He sees not the seed, but the tree 
which has sprung from it. Did he cast his bread 
upon the waters? He sees not the bread, but 
the hungering souls whom it has nourished. Did 
he labor, and pray, and live, for the salvation of 
souls ? He sees not his efforts, but their fruits, 



88 MEMORY. 

going forth, it may be, even for the healing of 
the nations. For these fruits are a part of his 
prayer of faith and labor of love. They were so 
in the determined counsel and foreknowledge of 
God. They are so in the undecaying memory 
which dwells with him in the home of the blessed. 
I say not, indeed, that these remembrances con- 
stitute the sole or the chief happiness of heaven. 
They are but the beginnings of celestial joy, — 
the starting-point on the career of eternal glory ; 
and thence there is a constant pressing onward 
and upward on the path which waxes brighter 
and brighter to the perfect day. 

There is one question which, I doubt not, has 
suggested itself to some of you. The best of men 
have been, to a greater or less degree, sinners ; 
and, if memory be perfect and entire, while the 
pious look back with pleasure upon their good 
deeds, must not the remembrance of their follies 
and sins cloud their joy, and mingle strains of 
sadness with their songs of rapture ? For those 
who deem piety the work of a moment, and who 
rely strongly on death-bed penitence, I care not 
to answer this question. I am entirely willing 
to leave their difficulties imsolved ; for the more 
numerous the doubts that hang over the fate of 
him whose first sighs of contrition are the last of 
life, the better is it for the living, while, with all 
our doubts, we can commit such a one, when dy- 
ing, to the overflowing mercy of God, and hope 



MEMORY. 89 

for the best. But for those who understand bj 
piety the frame of the life, not the hasty utter- 
ances of the death-agony, who mean by it faith 
and love made manifest in a sober, righteous, 
and godly conversation, I have a ready answer. 
To the awakened memory of the consistently 
virtuous, in the world to come, worthy and holy 
tlioughts and deeds must so occupy the fore- 
ground as to throw follies and sins completely 
into the shade. Then, too, against every diso- 
bedient purpose and act there will be written 
in the book of memory the cancelling vows of 
contrition that succeeded it, and the holy reso- 
lutions that forbade its repetition. The sins of 
the exemplary and devout will be to them in 
heaven as the sins of our infancy are to us 
now. We recollect our childish follies, and the 
chiding and the pain which attended them ; but 
if they were outgrown, forsaken, and forgiven, 
and if, while they lie back in the dim distance 
of many years, we have built fair and pleasing 
structures in the foreground, these so occupy the 
view as to prevent the eye from resting painfully 
on earlier guilt. But experience shows that in 
no other way can early sins be kept out of dis- 
tinct and appalling view ; nor can we conceive 
of any other way in which even repented sin 
can fail to disturb our peace in the world to 
come. The grovelling edifices of iniquity can- 
not conceal each other. Nor can virtue cover 

8* 



90 MEMORY. 

sin ; but, at best, can only eclipse it and cast 
it into the shade. 

If the views which I have now presented be 
just, they are of vast practical importance. They 
expound, and at the same time invest with a mo- 
mentous interest, such declarations of Scripture 
as these : — " God will bring every work into 
judgment, with every secret tiling, whether it 
be good or whether it be evil." " For every 
idle word which men shall speak they must 
give account at the ^day of judgment." If a 
book of remembrance is kept, and if every 
entry on its pages is to be brought to light, 
how vigilant should this prospect make us in 
the least things as well as in the greatest, in 
the government .of our hearts as well as in the 
conduct of our lives, — how prayerful against 
secret faults, — how watchful against besetting 
sins ! For the young, our doctrine has encour- 
agement and promise, offering them, if they will 
keep their youth undefiled, a stainless and bea- 
tific retrospect as the rich first-fruits of heav- 
enly joy. For those who have wandered from 
the path of rectitude, it utters a voice of warn- 
ing, bidding them trust not to a late repent- 
ance, which will still leave the book of remem- 
brance stained and blackened, and may not 
suffice to save them from a communion with 
the past, which will fill their disembodied spir- 
its with horror and despair. 



MEMORY. 91 

God also has a book of remembrance, com- 
posed of the fair and unspotted leaves from men's 
books ; and it is written " for them that fear the 
Lord, and think upon his name." May our 
books of remembrance be so pure and stainless 
that their record shall be transferred to his, that 
thus we may be among those of whom it is writ- 
ten, — "And they shall be mine, saith the Lord 
of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels ; 
and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own 
son that serveth him." 



SERMON YIII. 



SUDDEN DEATH. 

TE KNOW NEITHER THE DAY NOR THE HOUR WHEREIN THB 
SON OF MAN COMETH. — Matthew XXV. 13. 

Nature has her times and seasons. Through- 
out her inanimate and irrational kingdoms, bloom 
and decay, youth and age, life and death, succeed 
each other at periods that can be foreseen and 
calculated. The flowers discharge their bright 
ministry of love, elaborate their seeds, and die 
not till their work is done. The hoary oak re- 
tains its vigor for ages, is ages more in dying, 
and falls at last amid a giant progeny that has 
grown up to fill its place. The insect race fade 
with the leaf and die with the dying year. Their 
span is brief ; but they have grown old in it, have 
finished their work, and drop into timely dissolu- 
tion. Thus is it with all the tribes of animated 
nature. No infantile diseases prey upon them; 
no fever throbs in their young veins ; no palsy 
blights their active powers ; death, except by 



SUDDEN DEATH. 93 

violence, comes not at cock-crowing or in the 
morning, but only at eventide. But for man 
death chooses all seasons. The cradle is his ; 
and the first ecstasy of maternal joy is subdued 
into bitter wailing. Childhood and youth are his ; 
the laughing eye is quenched, the gleeful shout 
hushed. The prime of manhood and womanhood 
is his ; he blights the freshness of hope and prom- 
ise, and clothes in the garments of the grave 
those bound the most closely by the ties of life. 
He often sends no summons before him ; but 
floats unseen on the breeze, and has aimed his 
shaft before his approach is perceived. The 
morning is full of happy plans and bright visions ; 
at nightfall the cry goes forth, — "Make ready 
the shroud, prepare the pall." In the midst of 
life we are in death. Like the demoniac of old, 
we have our dwelling among the tombs. Hardly 
is there a spot or an object which the shadow of 
the grave has not hallowed to the memory of the 
deeply loved and early lost. Premature and sud- 
den dissolution has its voices for the living. To 
some of them let us now give heed. 

Such instances of death are a proof and a 
pledge of man's immortality, and are adapted to 
make us feel this truth, as well as believe it. 
Here is a child, budding with golden promise, 
the mind just awakened to self-consciousness, the 
heart twining its young affections around all that 
is fair and good, native innocence just ripening 



94 SUDDEN DEATH. 

into a virtue of choice and effort. Suddenly the 
decree goes forth, — "Cut it down." A wind 
passes over it, and it is gone. But why? It 
cumbered not the ground. It blessed the soil 
where it grew, and has left a balmy fragrance 
where it fell. Can it have become extinct, while 
so many clodlike existences, inane as the earth 
they tread, are suffered to live on ? 0, no ! Its 
root cannot have withered, though its stem is 
crushed. It has only been transplanted, where 
softer zephyrs, warmer suns, richer dews, shall 
make its bloom perennial. 

Here, again, is a man of ripe mind and noble 
heart. He fills a large and honored place in the 
public eye. Science, humanity, and piety all re- 
joice in his light. Weighty interests are confided 
to him, and momentous cares rolled upon him. 
It is high noon with him in his path of progress 
and of usefulness. But his sun is darkened at 
noonday, and he " goes to the grave in all his 
glorious prime," while charity weeps and the 
ways of Zion mourn. Yet, is he dead ? Can the 
caprice of powers above have extinguished such 
a burning and shining light, while the smoking 
flax still glimmers, and the feeble lamp of age 
still trims its flickering blaze ? We cannot thus 
believe. A new star in the firmament above was 
needed, and that which glowed with the purest 
lustre here was transferred to the galaxy around 
the throne of the Eternal. 



SUDDEN DEATH. 95 

Once more, here is a woman of pure mind and 
chastened affections, rich in good works, the or- 
nament of her household, the staff and stay of 
her parents, the tenderly loved of many hearts, 
with new scenes of happiness and spheres of du- 
ty just opening before her, and the fondest hopes 
just glimmering and dawning. At the very mo- 
ment when life offers the most for her to do and 
to enjoy, the arrow is sped, and she lies silent in 
unwarned dissolution. But can so much loveli- 
ness have died ? Can God have suffered a spirit 
so full of blessed influences, so radiant with in- 
telligence and kindness, to drop out of being, 
while he burdens the earth with so many of the 
selfish and depraved, who have lived unhonored, 
and might have died unwept ? This cannot be. 
There was a vacant mission of love in heaven, 
waiting her acceptance. She was found faithful 
in a lower sphere, and her Master has said to her, 
*•'- Friend, go up higher." 

Thus only can we interpret these sudden and 
premature removals of the pure and good. With- 
out a higher life, man is the greatest anomaly in 
existence, — the only broken column in creation. 
Everything else lives its span, and does its work. 
But man " cometh forth as a flower and is cut 
down ; he fleeth as a shadow, and continueth 
not." With him everything is incomplete and 
unfinished. A human life that seems entire in 
itself, reaches a natural period, and comes to the 



96 SUDDEN DEATH. 

grave in full age, like a shock of corn in its sea- 
son, is the rare exception, not the rule. And as 
God, having endowed man more highly than the 
rest of his creatures, cannot love him less, the 
mere light of nature might prompt the belief in a 
higher state of being, where this seeming incom- 
pleteness will be filled up, where defeated aims, 
broken plans, and unfinished works may all be 
consummated. Everything else we can compre- 
hend in the cycle bounded by earth and time. 
If man comes not within that cycle, it must be 
because his interests and fortunes belong to the 
larger cycle of eternity. It is this only that 
brings man into harmony with the rest of the cre- 
ation, and makes his being anything else than 
an insolvable enigma. 

I next remark, that sudden and premature 
deaths among the innocent and holy are precious, 
as giving us a nearer view of heaven than we can 
otherwise gain. When the chariot and horses of 
fire bore Elijah to paradise, think you not that it 
brought the home of the blessed very close to the 
mental vision of those who saw him go ? One 
who had just walked with them in the beauty 
of holiness, and spoken to them in the name of 
the Lord, whose wise and pious counsels were yet 
recent in their ears, the impress of whose energy 
and love was still fresh upon their hearts, had 
passed from them to heaven, and they could fol- 
low him thither, behold him the same there as 



SUDDEN DEATH. 97 

here, and feel that the traits of character which 
had so closely bound them to him were congenial 
with the world which he had entered. Similar 
is our feeling, when our worthy friends are sud- 
denly translated from our homes. The sky re- 
mains parted ; we trace their passage ; we follow 
them within the veil ; and, through the vivid im- 
pressions which they have left us of their charac- 
ters, we seem to see them still, the same in all 
that was good, entering upon the joys of paradise, 
sweeping the harps of heaven. It is as if a gem 
of unearthly radiance, which had shone in our' 
dwellings, which we had handled and sported in 
the sunlight, and gazed at in all its rainbow tints, 
had been snatched from our grasp, planted in the 
sky, and made a star. Impressions of this kind 
cannot be so strong, where long decay or infirm- 
ity has preceded death, so as to suspend the ac- 
tive energies of the soul, and to give scope only 
for the passive virtues. In such cases, our last 
converse has been with but a part of what our 
friend was, with an intensely interesting part in- 
deed, with faith, patience, and submission ; but 
still there has been a change, — the remembran- 
ces of health have become clouded, — sad associ- 
ations of groans, weakness, and ghastly disease 
have clustered around the loved form, so that we 
are but dimly conscious that it is the bright, en- 
ergetic, happy being of former days, that has 
entered into rest. Even our contemplations of 

9 



98 SUDDEN DEATH. 

heaven take a sombre hue, when we have been 
for weeks and months conversant with the gloom 
and suffering of its antechamber. But when 
death comes ere the eye is waxed dim or the nat- 
ural force abated, when our friend is removed in 
the prime of energy and fervor, our last remem- 
brances of the departed are of all that our friend 
was, and whatever there was in him of rare, and 
various, and well-developed moral strength and 
beauty remains in our minds as an abiding me- 
morial of the spirit and the life of heaven. 

Yet once more, the sudden, and what we call 
the untimely, death of those who are prepared to 
die, may be regarded as a relief and blessing to 
them. To survivors it is, indeed, unspeakably 
appalling. The contrast, the revulsion of feeling, 
the instantaneous prostration of plans and scat- 
tering of hopes, the blight which it seems to cast 
on every familiar scene and object, all conspire 
to aggravate the severity of the stroke. But 
from how many conflicts and sorrows has the de- 
parted one been saved ! He has not seen earthly 
objects fade one by one from his sickening gaze. 
His heart has not bled anew each day in the sun- 
dering of cherished ties. He has not known the 
bitterness of death. He has been spared the last 
adieus, the parting throes, the sight of agonized 
friends about his bedside, the anxieties for those 
to be left, which intrude themselves on the soul 
the best prepared to die. Perhaps, too, though 



SUDDEN DEATH. 99 

he dreaded not the world to come, he shrank 
from the passage to it, feared the moment of dis- 
solution, and felt, that, with all the joys of heaven 
in full prospect, the pains of death would still fill 
him with terror. But from this trial of his faith 
he has been exempted. The battle was fought, 
and the victory won, without his consciousness. 
He knew not that he was dying, till he found 
himself alive from the dead. His Master came 
at an hour when he thought not ; but found him 
watching, his lamp trimmed, his " feet shod with 
the preparation of the gospel of peace." And 
happy was that servant to have been borne, as on 
angels' wings, across those turbid waves which 
so many of the righteous must ford with fear and 
trembling. 

I cannot sympathize with the dread of sudden 
death, as such, which many feel. Only give me 
the full assurance that I am prepared to meet my 
God, that I am leading a Christian life, that my 
prevalent frame of mind is spiritual and heavenly, 
and I would even pray to be spared the slow de- 
cay of nature or disease, the sad farewell, the 
parting conflict, — I would beg of my Master to 
let me work in his vineyard till the very last mo- 
ment, and close my life with my labors. But 
such wishes, so far as we cherish them, let us 
breathe with submission, and with the willing- 
ness, if such be Heaven's decree, to glorify God 
in the pains of a last illness and a lingering 



100 SUDDEN DEATH. 

death ; for the cause of piety needs such suffering 
witnesses, and for the service which some must 
render all should hold themselves in readiness. 
If the chariot of fire comes for us, we will deem 
it a blessed privilege thus to go ; but if it be our 
lot to tread the dark valley with slow and painful 
steps, " even so. Father, for so it seems good in 
thy sight." And when, 

" Cast as a broken vessel by, 
Thy will we can no longer do, 
Yet, while a daily death we die, 
Thy power we will in weakness show, 
Our sufferings shall thy glory raise. 
Our speechless woe proclaim thy praise." 

But, my friends, what means this almost uni- 
versal shrinking from sudden death, as if the very 
words were a fearful talisman, synonymous with 
all that is terrific and nothing that is bright and 
happy in the world to come ? It is because we 
are so ill prepared for death. When the thought 
of removal without warning presents itself, our 
sins stare us in the face, and we cannot read our 
title to heaven clear. When some such visita- 
tion of Providence takes place among our kin- 
dred or neighbors, the warning is most thrillingly 
sent home to our hearts, — " Be ye also ready." 
We then feel pur liability to depart at any mo- 
ment. The ground seems to quake beneath us. 
We own that we have here no continuing city, 
and resolve to seek that city which hath founda- 



SUDDEN DEATH. 101 

tions. But with the terror, the resolution fades 
away, and very soon we are again Uving on as 
if the voice of Providence had not arrested us, — 
just as tlie frightened bird returns, the moment 
after, to the covert from which the fowler's step 
had startled her. But we are always in peril, 
and the most so when we are farthest from the 
thought of danger ; for the longer it is since the 
last event of the kind, the nearer at hand must 
the next be. Our daily path is by hidden pitfalls 
and lurking deaths. The puncture of a pin, the 
sting of an insect, a slight misstep, a flash from 
a storm-cloud, may send us at once from our 
bloom and prime to the judgment-seat of Christ. 
A sudden hemorrhage, from the very excess of 
health, or from some wanton feat of strength, 
may slied life's current from its broken bowl, 
when our mountain stands the firmest. Or soon 
insidious disease may prey secretly upon the seat 
of life, and we suspect it not till our hearts have 
throbbed their last pulse. There is not one of 
you who could pronounce himself less likely to 
die before nightfall, than could tliousands whom 
the morning has beheld full of vigor, and the 
evening in their shrouds. And are we ready ? 
Tlie decree may have gone forth concerning some 
one of us. Who knows but that preacher or 
hearer may make his next appeal in the silent 
eloquence of death ? I say these things not by 
way of rhetorical exaggeration, but because I 

9* 



102 SUDDEN DEATH. 

feel them. When I reflect on the many causes 
of death latent within me and around me, on the 
many avenues by which the breath of hfe may 
at any moment be expelled, on the frailty of 
every part of this complex frame, on its thou- 
sand strings, not one of which can be broken 
without the harp's becoming a tuneless ruin, 
on the numberless conditions which must all be 
fulfilled in order to keep the springs of being in 
motion for a single moment, I seem a wonder to 
myself, life becomes the mystery of mysteries, 
and God's guardian care an incessant miracle. 
When I think of these things, so far from being 
surprised at an occasional instance of sudden dis- 
solution, I marvel that it should occur so seldom. 
But I would not hold forth this event as the 
object of blind terror. I would rather urge you 
to that constant preparation of spirit, without 
which the slowest dissolution will seem too soon, 
with which death cannot come too soon or too 
suddenly. 

Let me, then, urge you to live prepared for 
the sudden sundering of domestic and social ties. 
Unreconciled enmities, open wounds, unquenched 
anger, arm death with a sting of tenfold sharp- 
ness. They have often cost bitter weeping for 
years over the graves of the injured. Is one 
who was the subject of other than kind senti- 
ments called away from our circle ? However 
ready we were in his lifetime to cast all the 



SUDDEN DEATH. 103 

blame upon him, death will soften his faults 
and heighten his virtues to our view, so that 
we shall feel ourselves alone guilty ; and love, 
reviving over the lifeless dust, will vent itself 
in vain longings to grasp the shadowy spirit in 
our reconciling embrace, to ask forgiveness of the 
ear for ever sealed, to call forth the once wont- 
ed glow of affection on tlie cheek for ever pale. 
And if we ourselves go hence with such wounds 
unhealed, must they not rankle in our disem- 
bodied spirits, cloud the light of eternity as it 
dawns upon us, embitter the streams of para- 
dise as they roll by us ? But " we know nei- 
ther the day nor the hour when the Son of Man 
Cometh." Our earthly household may be dis- 
solved at any moment ; and when we think 
the least of it, the parting hour may be near. 
With what a solemn emphasis, then, should the 
counsel be sent home to our souls, — " Let not 
the sun go down upon your wrath " ! How care- 
ful should we be to keep the unity of the spirit 
inviolate, the bond of peace unbroken, lest the 
gall of bitterness be instilled into some early 
cup of sorrow ! Let us so walk together, in 
our smaller and larger circles of kindred and 
intimacy, that no remembrances of broken faith 
or wounded love may haunt us at some future 
grave-side, or in tlie spiritual home to which 
we may soon be called. Let us go to our rest 
each night in peace with all men ; for we never 



104: SUDDEN DEATH. 

know, when we lie down, but that it is on our 
death-bed, or, when we rise up, but that it may 
be to the scene or tidings of another's unwarned 
doom. 

Above all, let us keep our hearts at peace with 
that God in whose unveiled presence we may at 
any moment find ourselves, — with that Redeem- 
er at whose judgment-bar the great account of 
life may be so speedily demanded. We are too 
prone to think of sudden death as if it were 
dropping into a frightful abyss. To the recon- 
ciled and prepared spirit, to the experienced and 
mature Christian, it is falling from the cradle 
of its infant being into everlasting arms of love 
beneath. But are we ready? We know not 
the day or the hour; but, come when it may, 
will it find us waiting ? Is there one of us who 
could receive, without a shudder, a final sum- 
mons so sudden as has often been sent to those 
around us ? I trust that there may be some 
of us over whom surviving friends would feel 
no fear, and whom God and Jesus would own 
and welcome. But is our every day spent as 
we could wish, were it to be our last ? This 
ought to be our standard, this our rule of life. 
Not that we should be of a sad countenance, 
or wear a funereal aspect ; for to live thus takes 
from death all its sadness and its bitterness. 
But every day should be marked by as earnest 
diligence in duty, as fervent a spirit of devotion, 



SUDDEN DEATH. 105 

as careful a heed to the dictates of conscience, 
as faithful a walk in the Redeemer's footsteps, 
as if on that one day were suspended all our 
interests for eternity. Happy is that servant 
whom his Lord, when he cometli, shall find 
thus living. 

But am I wrong in saying that some of you 
live with no more reference to death and eter- 
nity than if you had a lease of life at pleas- 
ure ? Every other contingent event you fore- 
see and provide for. Disasters in business, fire, 
fraud, and shipwreck, are the subjects of your 
most diligent precaution. You groimd plans, 
hopes, and fears on the death of others. All 
but yourselves seem mortal to you. But you 
are strong and well. You are not constitution- 
ally liable to acute disorders. Sudden death, 
while it has laid low your neighbors, has not 
actually entered your own doors. You are ex- 
empts. The destroyer may rage around you, 
but you feel that he cannot cross your thresh- 
old. 0, let multiplied warnings arouse you 
from your fatal security, your apathy at death's 
door, your slumber among the tombs ! The 
sands are fast running. The days of privilege 
are drawing to a close. With some of you, this 
may be the last ; would to God that it might 
be an effectual appeal, bidding you, in the words 
of holy writ, — " Turn ye, turn ye ; for why will 
ye die ? " 



106 SUDDEN DEATH. 

Let us not dismiss these contemplations "witli- 
out lifting our hearts in gratitude for that hope 
of immortality which gilds the shadow of death 
and the caverns of the grave. Do we mourn 
over virtuous friends, suddenly snatched from 
the large and cherished place which they filled 
in our affections ? Glory be to Jesus, that we 
mourn not without hope ! Our homes are made 
desolate ; but the grave is desolate also. It im- 
prisons not the beloved who have parted from us. 
We go thither to weep, and the angel of the res- 
urrection meets us ; the voice steals over us, — 
" They are not here, they are risen." Death is 
swallowed up in victory. They die no more, but 
are as the angels of Grod. The Lamb, who is in 
the midst of the throne, shall feed them, and 
shall lead them unto living fountains of waters, 
and God shall wipe away all tears from their 
eyes. A veil, indeed, must hang for a while 
between them and us. They and we must, for 
a season, pursue separate paths of duty, in sepa- 
rate mansions of our Father's house, — yet not 
divided. It is still one house and one family. 
Yet our faith is weak. We think too much of 
the dark coffin and the lonely grave, with which 
the departed have far less connection than our- 
selves. But could we lift our thoughts to the 
abode of their glory, could we catch the liymn^ 
note of their joy, could we get a momentary 
glimpse of their blissful state, it would arm us 



SUDDEN DEATH. 107 

with fortitude to bear our loss, fill us with thank- 
fulness for their unspeakable gain, and urge us 
ever onward and upward with unfaltering steps 
in the path which they trod before us. God 
grant to the deeply afflicted among us, that faith 
and patience may have their perfect work, that 
they may come forth as fine gold from the fur- 
nace, and may be found among those who through 
much tribulation have entered into the kingdom 
of God ! 



SERMON IX. 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

"W^E HAVE NOT FOLLOWED CUNNINGLY DEVISED FABLES, WHEN 
WE MADE KNOWN UNTO YOU THE POWER AND COMING OP 
OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST, BUT WERE EYEWITNESSES OF 
HIS MAJESTY. FOR HE RECEIVED FROM GOD THE FATHER 
HONOR AND GLORY, WHEN THERE CAME SUCH A VOICE TO 
HIM FROM THE EXCELLENT GLORY, THIS IS MY BELOVED 
SON, IN WHOM I AM WELL PLEASED. AND THIS VOICE 
WHICH CAME FROM HEAVEN WE HEARD, WHEN WE WERE 

WITH HIM IN THE HOLY MOUNT. — 2 Peter i. 16-18. 

My subject is our Lord's transfiguration. We 
know not the scene of this miracle. Monkish 
tradition has assigned it to Mount Tabor, but 
without any good ground. It probably occurred 
on one of the mountains north of the Sea of Gal- 
ilee, in the region of Caesarea Philippi. It was 
on the Sabbath, less than two weeks before our 
Saviour's death. It was his uniform custom, 
when he passed the Sabbath in any city or vil- 
lage, to attend the service of the synagogue ; but 
now, in the wilderness, he leads his three most 
intimate companions up into a secluded place of 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 109 

worship, probably in the evening, when, by Jew- 
ish reckoning, the day of rest began. He spends 
the hours in prayer. Meanwhile the weary dis- 
ciples fall asleep. And while they sleep, a glori- 
ous change passes over the form and features of 
their Master. A supernatural brightness shines 
from his face. His garments become a robe of 
light. There appear in familiar converse with 
him Moses and Elijah, the founder, the restorer, 
of the Jewish faith, the two great men of the 
ancient dispensation, — the one august and ven- 
erable as a leader and lawgiver, the other the 
loftiest of those sublime old seers who had thun- 
dered the decrees of Heaven into the ears of an 
apostate and rebellious nation. They talk with 
Jesus of his approaching sufferings and death. 
The apostles awake, and listen with amazement 
and intense interest to their communings. They 
are reluctant to quit this heavenly society for 
the dusty world beneath. On this lofty, secluded 
mountain they would have tlieir Master hold his 
court. " It is good to be here," cries the ardent, 
impulsive Peter ; — " let us, then, pitch three tents 
for our Master and his illustrious guests, and let 
us sit at their feet and hear their words." But 
while they speak, the heavenly visitors vanish 
in a luminous cloud, and from the cloud comes 
the voice of the Eternal, — " This is my beloved 
Son; hear ye him." 

We may trace, I think, with distinctness, two 

10 



110 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

express purposes which the transfiguration was 
designed and adapted to serve. 

1. It installed our Saviour in his true place 
and glory in the eyes of these three chief apos- 
tles. They had begun to look upon him as the 
promised Messiah ; but their conceptions of the 
Messiah were as yet low and narrow. They 
thought of him merely as a powerful Jewish 
king, who should mount the throne of David, 
govern by the law of Moses, keep alive the daily 
sacrifice, restore the decayed majesty of the ritual 
worship, and bring all the kindreds of the earth 
to bow with offerings and hosannas at the temple 
in Jerusalem. Thus was the Messiah in their 
gross conceptions subordinated to the law and 
the prophets ; and his instructions were not to 
constitute a new religion, but merely to be en- 
grafted on the old stock of Judaism. With these 
notions, they were ill prepared to receive from 
him any teachings which looked far beyond the 
creed of their fathers, and would have regarded 
with utter scepticism anything that might come 
in conflict with the perpetual obligations of the 
Levitical law. But the scene now before them 
is adapted to enlarge their views of their Mas- 
ter's mission and office. He is the chief person- 
age ; and the great lawgiver, the mighty prophet, 
appear but as ministering spirits to him, passing- 
over to him their insignia of authority, resign- 
ing to him their supremacy over God's people. 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. Ill 

They stay not with the awe-stricken disciples; 
for their commission has expired. They had pre- 
pared his way, had heralded his coming ; and 
now they vanish from his glorified presence, 
as stars fade before the sun. They were the 
servants, faithful in their day and for their 
work; but of him comes the voice, — "This 
is my beloved Son ; hear ye him." The apos- 
tles thus saw the three in their true places and 
relations, and were prepared to receive the new 
religion as an independent revelation, and to 
regard their Master as a teacher who, so far 
from borrowing light from those that went be- 
fore liim, reflected back light upon them, mak- 
ing it their highest glory that they foresaw and 
foretold the day of his appearing. 

This lesson of the transfiguration many Chris- 
tians need. There is, there always has been, in 
the Church of Clirist a great deal of Judaism, — 
a clinging to what is worn out, outgrown, and 
done away, — a preference for that which is in 
part over that which is perfect. Many stop at 
Moses, instead of going on to Christ. There 
are prevalent in many parts of the Church un- 
christian notions of doctrine and duty, derived 
from the Old Testament, which represent a cer- 
tain stage of progress from darkness to light, 
but fall short of the revelation made in the 
Gospel. Thus there are certain harsh, stern 
views of the Pivine character entertained by 



112 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

many, which have no support in the New Testa- 
ment, nor yet any in the Old, properly under- 
stood, but which mark the point of attainment 
reached by the covenant people in passing from 
polytheism and idolatry towards the sublime con- 
ception of God as a Father, which first had its 
full development in the words of Jesus. Thus, 
also, many Christians deem the retaliation of in- 
jury, even to blood for blood, a Christian duty, 
because it was enjoined by Moses ; whereas un- 
der him the enactment of literal retaliation, and 
nothing more, was but a stage in the human- 
izing process by which men were gradually re- 
claimed from the practice of reckless and un- 
measured vengeance, and prepared for Christ's 
law of perfect love and prompt forgiveness. Let 
me not be misunderstood. I cherish a faith 
which has no room to grow stronger in the di- 
vine origin of the Old Testament revelation and 
religion. But it was not the whole truth, — not 
absolute truth ; else there had been no need of 
a more perfect law. It was truth with reference 
to the sins which it rebuked and the errors which 
it dispelled ; but on every point it left undis- 
closed much that is essential to the perfect cul- 
ture of the race. On every point Christ reveals 
more, and goes farther, than Moses. And Christ 
is our law and our authority. The law and the 
prophets are but steps to his throne. On his face 
rests the brightness of heaven ; his are the robes 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 113 

of light ; and Moses and Elijah shine only in the 
rays that go forth from his countenance. In our 
theology let us not, then, build the three taberna- 
cles, but one holy of holies to the great high- 
priest who has passed into the heavens ; for in 
him all preceding dispensations have their com- 
pletion and fulfilment. 

2. The second great purpose of our Saviour's 
transfiguration had reference to himself. It was 
one of the agencies employed by God for the de- 
velopment of his moral perfection, of his power 
of effort and endurance. That Jesus, though he 
knew no sin, was yet gradually fitted and perfect- 
ed for his arduous and world-embracing mission, 
for the agony of his cross and the triumph of his 
death, the testimony of Scripture leaves us no 
room to doubt. St. Luke speaks of his growing 
in wisdom, and in favor with God and man. 
The writer to the Hebrews says, — "It became 
him, for whom are all things, and by whom are 
all things, in bringing many sons into glory, 
to make the Captain of their salvation perfect 
through sufferings." And again, — " Though he 
were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things 
which he suffered, and, being made perfect, he 
became the author of eternal salvation unto all 
them that obey him.'* That he felt the need 
and experienced the power of aid from heaven 
would appear from the frequency of his seasons 
of prolonged supplication to God, and from the 

10* 



114 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

instances in wliich, at striking emergencies of his 
life, there were special interpositions for his sup- 
port and relief. 

Our Saviour was now going to die. His war- 
fare was well-nigh accomplished. There was 
everything before Mm to fill the prospect with 
anguish and dread. Physical torture and suffer- 
ing were to form but a small part of the bitter- 
ness of his cup. His bosom friends were to be 
left as sheep without a shepherd in the season of 
their greatest helplessness and need. Those 
whom he had invited, warned, and cherished, 
those whose sick he had healed, whose dead he 
had raised, whose maniacs he had restored, were 
to be his accusers and his murderers. He was 
to pass from among the living under circumstan- 
ces the most revolting to that deep moral sen- 
sibility, to those sentiments of piety and love, 
wliich his exalted character and mission can have 
rendered only the more intense and delicate. 
By every vile form of impiety and blasphemy 
was his pure spirit to be kept in protracted tor- 
ture. 

The scene now under consideration was one 
of the instrumentalities ordained to strengthen 
our Saviour for conflict and for agony. Those 
who had overcome were sent to minister to him 
who was to suffer. They spake of his approach- 
ing deatli. They, too, had been sufferers; and 
their deepest griefs and injuries had been of the 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 115 

same type with his. Men nerved to exposure 
and hardship, full of vigor and intrepidity, they 
had made slight account of their outward priva- 
tions and sufferings, nor do we hear from them a 
word of complaint as to toil, or wandering, or 
want. Moses led his people in the desert for 
forty years, and that in extreme old age ; yet 
" his eye was not dim, nor his natural force abat- 
ed." But he mourned, in the deepest prostra- 
tion of spirit, for the ingratitude and impiety of 
his nation, and in their obstinacy and frequent 
rebellion bore a daily burden of care and grief. 
Elijah encountered hunger, desolation, persecu- 
tion. He was driven from city to desert, and from 
desert to mountain. But no peril daunted him ; 
no opposition quenched his zeal. Yet he, too, 
was filled with anguish for the sins of his people, 
and in the solitude of the cavern poured out his 
complaint, that the children of Israel had forsaken 
Jehovah's covenant, thrown down his altars, and 
slain his prophets. How appropriate companions 
for the great Witness of the truth, at this hour, 
were these sufferers for righteousness' sake ! Most 
fittingly might they have talked " of his decease 
which he should accomplish at Jerusalem," and 
communed with him of the unfailing triumph of 
truth and the sure victory of virtue, — of the 
sympathy of all heaven with sacrifices and sor- 
rows incurred from love for the children of God. 
Not of death in its dreariness and dread did they 



116 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

talk, but of death met with faith and submission, 
made calm and happy by the breath of prayer, 
lost in victory by the near view of the crown of 
life that fadeth not away. In this heavenly pres- 
ence, the Saviour, clothed in hght, received the 
earnest of the reward tliat awaited him as death's 
conqueror and man's Redeemer. It was for him 
a scene full of refreshment, solace, and strength. 
It blended rays of heavenly glory with the dark- 
est scenes of earth, the sympathy of pure and ex- 
alted spirits with the contempt and contumely of 
the low and vile, visions of triumph with impend- 
ing torture and agony, the light of immortal life 
with the overhanging darkness of the grave. The 
heavenly forms, the voice of attestation, gave our 
Saviour's mission thus far the seal of the Divine 
acceptance, assured him that the living sacrifice 
of a weary and suffering pilgrimage had been well 
pleasing to the Father, and gave him new energy 
to complete the offering in agony and blood. 

These purposes seem to have been the chief 
ends of the transfiguration. It may also suggest 
many important lessons for our faith and practice. 
To a few of these let us now direct our thoughts. 

Let me first ask. In what did this miracle con- 
sist ? Did it create a new state of things, or did 
it simply reveal a state that always exists ? The 
latter, as seems to me. When angels and just 
men made perfect appear in converse with our 
Saviour, it is not their being among mortals, but 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 117 

their becoming visible to the outward eye, that 
constitutes the miracle. Heaven, I believe, is 
not afar off, but unspeakably near, compassing 
our homes, encircling our daily ways. As all 
around us, on leaves and in dew-drops on a sum- 
mer's day, there are myriads of living beings too 
minute for the bodily eye to discern, so there is 
no doubt constantly about us a cloud of unseen 
spirits too ethereal for our gross vision, — the 
hosts of God encamp around our dwellings, — 
strains of celestial praise, such as hailed the Sav- 
iour's birth, are always borne, though unheard, 
on our night air, — 

" Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth 
Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep." 

It was no rare thing, though an amazing sight, 
when Elisha beheld angelic hosts drawn out for 
his defence. Nor had the hills of Judasa grown 
unfamiliar to Moses and Elijah, who now " ap- 
peared in glory." The whole tenor of Scripture 
brings the two worlds together, makes us feel 
that they are as one world, — that our departed 
friends, and the wise and holy of all times, may 
be around us and with us. Could we feel this 
always as we do at some favored seasons, would 
it not be an ever-present rebuke to our negli- 
gence and sin, an unceasing stimulus to diligence 
and heavenly-mindedness ? Would not voices 
no longer heard on earth be our unceasing mon- 
itors of duty, and re-echo in thrilling tones every 



118 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

prompting of conscience and eyery precept of the 
Divine word? Would not the venerable dead, 
even more than the living, be onr teachers and 
our guides? I love to look on the transfigura- 
tion, and on similar scenes in our Saviour's .pil- 
grimage, as but revelations, manifestations of the 
spiritual life, which in numberless forms perpet- 
ually surrounds us ; and I feel, that, next to the 
presence of God and the love of Jesus, we can 
have no motive to duty so strong as the assur- 
ance that the most revered and the best beloved 
of those that have entered upon the higher life 
survey with intense interest the path of our pil- 
grimage, and that their joy is enhanced by our 
fidelity and devotion. 

Again, the seasons when our Saviour enjoyed 
the nearest communion with heaven deserve our 
special regard. When was it that angels and 
glorified spirits became manifest in his society ? 
Not when the multitudes thronged him, and 
children sang hosannas in the temple, — not 
during his few and brief seasons of ease and 
outward success. They first came to him after 
his forty days' temptation, wken he had contend- 
ed in lonely prayer with every allurement which 
could draw liim aside from his appointed work. 
Again, in the scene now before us, came Moses 
and Elijah. And of what talked they with him ? 
Not of crowns, or of applauding multitudes, but 
of his approaching agony and death. Again, 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 119 

when in Gethsemane he wrestled with the se- 
verest powers of evil, and won the victory be- 
fore his hour had come, there appeared an angel 
from heaven strengthening him. Are not these 
things written that heaven may seem nearest to 
us when trials most abound, in loneliness and 
weariness, in desertion and agony, — that we 
may bring the unseen world into the clearest 
\iew when the power of evil is the strongest, 
and that, when no earthly voice gives us com- 
fort or a God speed, we may feel that angels min- 
ister to -us and glorified spirits urge us heaven- 
ward ? 

Finally, the scene of the transfiguration was 
brief and transitory. The amazed and delighted 
apostles would have had it prolonged. Peter 
said, — " It is good for us to be here." But 
Jesus judged otherwise. Congenial to his spirit 
as were these heavenly communings, he never 
protracted them, but made them only his brief 
seasons of refreshing in the intervals of toil and 
conflict. On the eve of the Sabbath he had as- 
cended the mountain ; in the morning he returns 
to his work of unrequited love, and from the sub- 
lime converse of glorified spirits he plunges at 
once into a stubborn and unbelieving multitude, 
and enters with the most prompt and tender sym- 
pathy into one of the most afflictive cases of dis- 
ease that ever demanded his aid. 

Here we have a beautiful example of what the 



320 THE TRANSFIGURATION. 

disciple's life ought to be. There is something 
fascinating in the walks of retired devotion ; and 
many have been the saintly spirits, like Thomas 
a Kempis, that have been nurtured in clois- 
ters, and have been wholly intent on heavenly 
contemplations. In our day, and among Prot- 
estants, we sometimes see a tendency to an aes- 
thetic, meditative piety, which seeks the refresh- 
ments, without bearing the burdens, of the Gos- 
pel, — which would wear the crown, but shrinks 
from the cross, — which loves to commune with 
God and heaven, yet likes not to go as a mes- 
senger from heaven among the doubting, the 
heavy laden, the suffering, and the sinning. Not 
thus do we learn Christ, as we view him, first on 
the holy mountain, and then on the plain be- 
neath. Not always on the mountain can his 
true follower be ; but often in the working-day 
world, in the busy, active walks of life, wher- 
ever a Christian example can be felt, a Christian 
influence breathed, the unction of a pure and 
loving spirit shed abroad, — often, too, where 
there is misery to be relieved, sorrow to be 
soothed, error to be reclaimed, sin to be put 
away. The Christian must work as well as 
pray, — must bless men no less than he praises 
God, — must have his post of positive duty on 
earth no less than his conversation in heaven, — 
must so blend contemplation and activity, that in 
his retired hours he shall wear none of the fea- 



THE TRANSFIGURATION. 121 

tures of a recluse or an ascetic, and in his busy 
seasons shall never forget that he is a friend of 
Christ and an heir of heaven. As by the rever- 
ence of the old painters our Lord was distin- 
guished by a halo in every scene and on every 
occasion, so should his disciple always bear about 
with him rays of his Master's image. 

It is only by this blending of contemplative 
and active piety, that the highest results of char- 
acter can be reached, and the highest religious 
enjoyment be attained. He who is cold and self- 
ish towards man, or neglectful of outward duty, 
cannot see God in prayer, or enjoy the full lux- 
ury of religious meditation. But God and Christ 
are always near, and heaven is ever open, to the 
good and faithful servant. When he prays, no 
shadow of self intervenes between him and the 
Father. When he meditates on his Saviour, he 
feels drawn towards him by the bonds of a close 
spiritual kindred. When his thoughts mount to 
heaven, they knock not in vain at the golden gate. 
And his hours of prayer, his seasons of quiet med- 
itation, always send him back with a more trust- 
ing, hopeful, fervent spirit, to do the work of life. 

These views are beautifully illustrated by an 
old Romish legend, with which I close. A pious 
monk, one day, when he had been unusually fer- 
vent in his devotions, found his darkened cell 
suddenly illuminated by an unearthly light, and 
there stood before liim a vision of the Saviour, 
11 



122 THE' TRANSFIGURATION. 

his countenance beaming with godlike love, his 
hand outstretched with a gesture of kind invita- 
tion. At that moment rang the convent-bell, 
which called the monk, in the regular course of 
his duty, to distribute alms to the poor at the gate. 
For an instant he hesitated ; but the next instant 
found him, true to the vow of charity, on his way 
to the gate. The poor relieved, the work of love 
complete, he returned in sadness to his cell, 
doubting not that the heavenly vision had taken 
flight. But, to his surprise and joy, it was still 
there, and with a smile even more full than be- 
fore of divine beauty and ineffable love ;. and 
there came from it the words, — "Hadst thou 
staid, I had fled." 



SEHMON X 



THE RESUERECTIOK 
{Preached on Easter Sunday , 1845.) 

IF CHRIST BE NOT RISEX, THEN IS OUR PREACHING VAIN, AND 

YOUR FAITH IS ALSO VAIN. — 1 Corintliians xv. 14. 

This is a glad day for the Church, — the sec- 
ond birthday of its Prince and Head, — the day 
when he showed himself immortal, and wrote 
over the gates of the grave, for the whole com- 
pany of his disciples, — " Because I live, ye shall 
live also.'' " The power of his resurrection," — 
how must the apostles have felt it ! Their only 
concern was that he might be decently buried, 
and might be laid where they could reach his 
lifeless body with the vain offices of bereaved af- 
fection. They go to the sepulchre to weep there ; 
they return assured that he still lives. Their 
withered hopes are now renewed, — their lost 
Master is theirs again and for ever ; and because 
he has risen, they now know that the mansions 
in the Father's house are no fable, — that death 



124 THE RESURRECTION. 

has no fatal sting, and the grave no enduring ter- 
ror. As in harmony with the spirit of this anni- 
versary, I propose this morning, first, to show 
you how much mankind needed express testi- 
mony from God with reference to a life to come, 
and then to illustrate the peculiar value of 
Christ's resurrection as bearing witness to man's 
immortality. 

In order to test man's need of a revelation of 
eternal life, let us inquire how, without an ex- 
press revelation, he could obtain the knowledge 
of his own immortality. Apart from special Di- 
vine communications, our sources of knowledge 
are consciousness, observation, experience, and 
human testimony. Immortality is necessarily 
out of the range of consciousness ; for we cannot 
be conscious of the future. By observation and 
experience we can barely infer what may proba- 
bly take place from what has already taken place ; 
and if the continuance of life after the event 
called death has neither formed a part of our ex- 
perience, nor fallen under our observation, we 
cannot derive our faith in immortality from these 
sources. Human testimony, as regards contin- 
ued existence after death, cannot transcend the 
range of human experience ; and if the veil of 
eternity has never been miraculously lifted, then 
can no man bear testimony as to what lies beyond 
the grave. • 

We often hear, indeed, of arguments for a fu- 



THE RESURRECTION. 125 

ture life drawn from the analogies of outward 
nature, — from the transformation of the earth- 
worm through death into a higher form of life, 
— from the forthputting of the foliage, and the 
upspringing of the grass and the flowers, after 
their winter's death. The kernel of wheat, it 
is said, dies and is decomposed, but reappears 
in the blade, the ear, the ripening sheaf. All 
Nature wraps herself in her burial garment, — 
the winter's snows are her winding sheet ; but 
she lays aside her funeral robe and springs in 
fresh and beautiful life from the grave. These 
analogies were before the eyes of the apostles 
and the holy women who presided over our 
Lord's interment. It was in the full and gor- 
geous glory of an Asiatic spring that they laid 
him in the tomb ; and his tomb was in a garden, 
surrounded by these boasted emblems of immor- 
tality. Why did not every green leaf and open- 
ing bud say to them, — " He whom ye bury will 
rise again " ? Or, to make the question more 
comprehensive, I would ask. Why were not these 
analogies observed or thought oiit by those who, 
in earlier times and in pagan countries, reasoned 
wisely and well of the mysteries of nature and 
of human life ? Tiiey were not. At least, I 
have never met with them in any classic writ- 
er. The ancient philosophers, when they reason 
about immortality, aim by the most flimsy soph- 
istry to prove the pre-existence and past eternity 
11* 



126 THE RESURRECTION. 

of the human soul, and thence infer its future 
eternity. 

I think that I can show you why these hope- 
ful analogies were not observed, or, if observed, 
were not relied on, before the resurrection of 
Christ. Analogy proves nothing. It is merely 
a similarity of relations or principles between 
beings or objects of different classes ; and to 
reason from analogy is to infer resemblances of 
which we are ignorant from those which we 
know to exist. And this we can never do with 
certainty, seldom with a high degree of proba- 
bility, especially when the objects about which 
we reason are of widely different classes ; for 
there must always be some point where resem- 
blance ceases and difference begins, and there 
is always room to suspect that this point may 
lie between the resemblance which we know 
and that which we infer. Thus, the kernel of 
wheat, the caterpillar, and man, are objects of 
widely different classes. They resemble each 
other in being the creatures of God and organ- 
ized existences. ' But they are so unlike in their 
modes both of life and of death, that we have 
no right whatever to infer, that, because some- 
thing like a resurrection takes place with the 
kernel and the caterpillar, it also will with 
man. 

What, then, is the true province of analogy ? 
It is adapted to answer objections to truths of 



THE RESURRECTION. 127 

which we are assured from other sources of 
evidence. Here analogy is a valid ground of 
argument. It can remove apparent improba- 
bility from what at first sight seems strange, if 
true. It is no longer strange, if we can show 
that the same thing is true, that the same law 
or principle holds good, with regard to beings 
or objects of a different class. Thus, the doc- 
trine of human immortality, if true, is a stupen- 
dous and amazing truth ; and when the mind 
is first assured of it by miracidous testimony 
from God, it yet seems something too great and 
too good to be believed, and we look around 
through the universe in a state of partial in- 
credulity, and ask, — " Is there anything like 
a resurrection in any of the departments of na- 
ture with which we are conversant?" We see 
that there is. We see the butterfly come forth 
from his rent sepulchre, — the green blade from 
the grave where the sower hid the seed. We 
see that all nature dies and lives again. Our 
scepticism as to what God has revealed concern- 
ing our own future life is removed, and we are 
prepared to receive this momentous disclosure 
with an earnest and loving faith. This is the 
use which Saint Paul makes of the argument 
from analogy in the chapter from which our 
text is taken. He first from the resurrection 
of Ciirist proves that of all men, — represents 
the latter as inseparable from the former, — de- 



128 THE RESURRECTION. 

nies the possibility of preaching or believing that 
man will rise, if Christ has not risen. But then 
comes the sceptical inquiry, " How can this be ? 
How can the dead be raised, and with what 
bodies ? " In reply, he exhibits in the outward 
universe instances of a resurrection of virtually 
the same being in a different form, as in the case 
of the kernel of wheat, which, without changing 
its identity, reappears in a different form from 
that in which it was thrown into the ground. 
By this analogy, he shows that there is in the 
annual course of nature a well-known fact, mul- 
tiplied myriads of times over, in itself equally 
strange and encompassed by the same difficulties 
with the resurrection of man. 

We see, then, that as to immortality nature is 
voiceless, and man the prey of unceasing doubt, 
except through Divine revelation. And does not 
the history of human belief and experience con- 
firm my statement ? Where, out of the pale of 
revealed religion, can you find an instance of 
firm, sufficient, satisfying faith in immortality, 
— of a faith strong enough to sustain the soul 
in its seasons of the severest need, and to give 
it triumph in death? I know not a single in- 
stance. The dying Socrates made the nearest 
approach to such a faith ; but between a Chris- 
tian death-scene and his, there is a heaven-wide 
contrast. " I have strong hope," said he, " that 
I am now going to the company of good men ; 



THE RESURRECTION. 129 

but on a matter encompassed with so much 
doubt, it becomes us not to be too confident." 
Wliat term of comparison is there between such 
a timid, hesitating hope, and the full, clear faith 
of thei believer in Christ, whose whole soul goes 
forth in the glad declaration, — ''I know that 
my Redeemer liveth, and that his disciple cannot 
die " ? The most striking characteristic of the 
Christian's death is the more than faith, the con- 
fidence that will not entertain a doubt, the al- 
most unveiled vision of the life to come, that 
plays before the eyes just closing upon earthly 
scenes. I have spoken of the greatest and most 
revered of the ancient philosophers ; and often 
has his image come up before me in the cham- 
bers of penury, and by the death-bed of the 
lowly, and, except in the word of God, unlet- 
tered, and constrained me to say to myself, — 
" Surely the least in the kingdom of heaven is 
greater than he." 

There were others of those old philosophers 
who spoke fearlessly of death. But how ? By 
bracing themselves up to look steadily and with 
flinty face at the dread alternative of annihila- 
tion. To prove that annihilation is no evil is the 
object of full half of Cicero's celebrated treatise 
on immortality ; and Seneca, who talks more 
than any of the ancients about the contempt of 
death, manifestly leans towards the belief that 
death is the end of all things. Nor have I ever 



130 THE RESURRECTION. 

known or read of a happy and hopeful death any- 
where in Christendom among those who could 
not fix the eye of faith upon the risen Redeemer. 
Avowed deists have sunk into their last sleep, 
sometimes in brutish indifference, sometimes in 
indescribable agony of soul. Those of our own 
day and country, who, though claiming to be 
called Christians, deny the resurrection, yet 
live ; and may God grant them a better mind 
and a less icy creed, before the chill of death 
creeps over them ! 

Our need of the Saviour's resurrection as a 
support for our faith in immortality may yet fur- 
ther appear from considering the times when we 
most need this faith. They are not seasons when 
the intellectual powers are in the fullest activity, 
so as to permit us to take in a wide range of 
thought, and gather in from the expanse of na- 
ture or the phenomena of life arguments or illus- 
trations for our faith. But a fact, an example, 
the mind can always apprehend ; and it appeals 
also to the imagination, — a faculty which never 
slumbers, and is often most active and vivid when 
the reasoning powers are the least so. When the 
mind is overwhelmed by some sudden stroke of 
bereavement, or is intent on the passing death- 
scene of one tenderly beloved, or is distracted by 
the pains and infirmities of acute and fatal ill- 
ness, it cannot ransack heaven and earth for as- 
surances of immortality ; and yet it needs some- 



THE RESURRECTION. 131 

tiling above and beyond itself on wliicli to fix 
its steadfast regards of trust and hope. And at 
such a season, while even distinct self-conscious- 
ness seems suspended, and there is no ear for the 
myriads of voices from the outward world, or 
even for the tenderest human comforter who 
speaks of earthly things, the soul can look to 
the Saviour's forsaken sepulchre, can see the 
burial garments drop from his reanimated form, 
and can hear as from the very lips of the Re- 
deemer, as the angel rolls the stone away, — 
" He that believe th in me shall never die." 

I shall go from the sanctuary to-day to the 
home of a widow bereft of her only son, faithful, 
kind, devoted, the staff of her age, her first grief 
in his behalf that which rends her heart when 
she knows that he is dead. With what words 
shall I comfort the forlorn mother ? Shall I 
babble to her of flowers and butterflies, and talk 
about the opening spring ? Or shall I enter 
into a metaphysical disquisition on the nature 
and laws of spirit, and attempt a labored proof 
of immortality, on grounds which her lacerated 
mind can neither apprehend nor follow ? Or 
shall I tell her to look within, in proud self-re- 
liance, for her faith and her support, when her 
stricken and desolate spirit feels more than ever 
its neediness and its dependence, and craves the 
voice and the sustaining arm of the Almighty ? 
0, no ! I should seem a wanton mocker of her 



132 THE RESURRECTION. 

misery. But I can tell her of the widow of 
Nain, and who stopped the bier, — I can talk 
to her of the new tomb in Joseph's garden, 
and of the vision of angels on the resurrection 
morning ; and I know that my words will not 
seem to her as idle tales, but as the power and 
wisdom of God for her relief and consolation. 

Here let me remark, that, in these times of in- 
tense need, minds are to a great degree equalized. 
The strongest mind, undisciplined by faith, and 
inured to a godless self-dependence, then finds it- 
self weak ; while the loftiest and richest intellect 
in the school of Christ stoops to look into the 
place where the Lord lay, and yields itself to the 
guidance of humble, childlike faith. At such 
seasons, we all crave assurances of immortality 
congenial with the passing scene, covering the 
same ground, woven (so to speak) of the same 
material. We demand to see actual instances 
of resurrection in a body like our own, — death 
visibly " swallowed up in life." I am delighted 
to find, as I write, the testimony of one of the 
truly great men of our times, recently deceased, 
to the adaptation of our Saviour's resurrection to 
his own moral nature and necessities. I refer 
to the late Dr. Arnold, whom it would be hard to 
convict of weakness or superstition. Speaking of 
a death in his own family, he writes, — " Noth- 
ing afforded us such comfort, when shrinking 
from the outward accompaniments of death, the 



THE RESURRECTION. 133 

grave, the grave-clothes, the loneliness, as the 
thought that all these had been around our Lord 
himself, round him who died, and is now alive 
for evermore." 

And now let me ask, — "Why should it be 
thought a thing incredible, that God should raise 
the dead?" What good ground is there for 
scepticism as to the fact of our Saviour's resur- 
rection, if we only admit the doctrine of immor- 
tality as probable ? To my mind, there is none. 
But, on the other hand, I should expect to find 
that something of the kind had taken place. I 
should expect to find instances of a visible resur- 
rection somewhere in the world's history. And 
had they not occurred, notliing short of mathe- 
matical demonstration would suffice to convince 
me of a life to come. If, when the body dies, 
the soul lives on, it is of inestimable importance 
that this fact should be made known to men, to 
all men, to the unlettered no less than to the 
highly endowed ; and we cannot conceive that 
a good God should not have made it known. 
But how could it be so clearly made known, and 
brought so near to the apprehension of minds of 
every class, as by an illustrious and fully attested 
example ? If the soul lives on, was it not to be 
expected, that, in one instance at least, it should 
return to reanimate the body, — to show that the 
grave is not a place of eternal sleep, and that no 
child of God can die ? To the great mass of 

12 



134 THE RESURRECTION. 

mankind, constituted as they are, this was the 
most striking and satisfying proof that could 
have been offered. A single example is worth 
more than an accumulated mass of the most co- 
gent argument ; for the argument, at most, only 
shows that the thing may be, while the example 
shows that the thing is. Only take man's con- 
tinued life after death for granted, and can you 
conceive, that, under the government of a benig- 
nant Grod, the curtain should not in a single in- 
stance have been lifted from that life, and no 
voice should ever have been sent from it to reas- 
sure those yet in bondage to the fear of death ? 
To me the glimpses of another world which 
Scripture history lets in seem no less natural and 
truth-like tlian beautiful and touching. They 
are, to my mind, just what might have been an- 
ticipated, — enough to make us sure of a world 
to come, and yet not enough to make us weary 
of this life before our time. And most of all 
should I have expected to find this miracle of a 
visible resurrection wrought in the person of Him 
whose express mission it was to reveal to man his 
divine lineage and his immortal destiny, and to 
wake him from the death of sin to a life worthy 
of God and of heaven. 

Before we part, let us put to ourselves the mo- 
mentous practical inquiry. Are we partakers of 
our Master's resurrection ? The apostle says, — 
" He has abolished death " ; and this language 



THE RESURRECTION. 135 

is literal rather than figurative. Tlie incident, 
death, indeed remains ; but its significance is 
destroyed. It is not the close, or even the sus- 
pension, of being. It breaks not the continuity 
of life. It is simply an unclotliing of the soul, 
— a change of its raiment. Christ's resurrec- 
tion makes both worlds one, reveals to us the 
life on this and oil the other side of the grave 
as one life. " I go, and come again," were his 
own words in relation to what we call death ; 
and to his disciple the last earthly hour is de- 
parture, not death. Before he rose, there was a 
great gulf between the two worlds. There were, 
indeed, in the ancient writings of the covenant 
people, one or two instances in which mortals 
were said to have crossed this gulf; and Jesus 
had now multiplied these instances in the case 
of private persons, who had mingled again with 
th<*v great mass of the people, and bore about 
with them none of the marks of death. But 
now the Teacher, the Saviour, he upon whom 
are the eyes of the whole nation, on their great 
feast-day, in the presence of thousands, is slain, 
and borne off for burial. He is taken from the 
prime of life and energy, and his last night has 
been full of stirring, constraining eloquence, so 
that its counsels and promises have ever since 
been the choicest treasury of consolation for 
God's afflicted cliildren. Thus full of activity 
and love, he is cut off from the land of the liv- 



136 THE RESURRECTION. 

ing. And, lo ! on the morning of the third day 
he is again walking with his friends, his wounds 
still open and manifest, while his enemies rage 
in impotent anger, that he on whose sepulchre 
they had stamped the seal of absolute power, and 
stationed a guard never known to quail before 
mortal arm, should have burst the seal, put the 
keepers to flight, and resumed his benign mis- 
sion among the living. Should not the contem- 
plation of his passage from world to world unite 
both worlds in our view, and open to our famil- 
iar thoughts an infinite domain of being in close 
connection with our present state ? Let us live 
as if the two worlds were one, — as children of 
the resurrection, — as those that cannot die, but 
must go hence, and must carry hence the very 
souls that have thought, enjoyed, and suffered 
here. 

Again, the resurrection of Jesus, with its ac- 
companying circumstances, inspires the happiest 
sentiments with regard to our friends that sleep 
in him. Our Saviour always spoke of his resur- 
rection as the example of that of all men. If, 
as some think, there is to be an oblivion of all 
earthly ties in the grave, and we shall know each 
other no more for ever, he would have intimated 
this by coming forth barely to manifest himself at 
a distance, and to live apart from those whom he 
had loved till death. How different the case ! 
We see him hastening at once to show himself 



THE RESURRECTION. 137 

to those who had most regretted his departure, 
meeting the faithful mourners who had gone ear- 
ly to the grave to weep there, sending kind mes- 
sages to Peter, crossing the path of the disciples on 
their way to Emmaus, joining the eleven as they 
were assembled on that same night in the large 
upper room, and for forty days dwelling among his 
friends as lovingly as before his death. Are we 
wrong in inferring from these things, that, among 
those who share his resurrection, love remains 
unquenched, — that, among his redeemed, every 
soul will attach itself to those with whom its 
early lot was cast and the fibres of its first being 
interwoven ? 

Finally, let the contemplation of our risen Re- 
deemer prepare us for the time when friends 
shall watch in sadness by our death-pillows. 
May we have so walked in the light of immor- 
tality, made manifest through him, that in the 
last earthly hour we shall feel and fear no evil. 
With calm and quiet confidence may we then 
look to him, who has been our ^guide in life, 
as the conqueror of death and the forerunner of 
our freed spirits in their eternal path of duty and 
progress. 



12* 



SERMON XI 



THE ASCENSION. 

AND HE LED THEM OUT AS FAR AS TO BETHANY ; AND HE 
LIFTED UP HIS HANDS AND BLESSED THEM. AND IT CAME 
TO PASS, WHILE HE BLESSED THEM, HE WAS PARTED FROM 
THEM, AND CARRIED UP INTO HEAVEN. — Luke Xxiv. 50, 51. 

The narrative of the ascension is given by- 
Mark and Liike in their Gospels, and again by 
Luke, with greater minuteness of detail, in the 
Acts of the Apostles. It has its prominent place 
in the last-named record, because from this event 
the apostles dated their commission as heads and 
lawgivers of the spiritual household. We find, 
accordingly, tl^at they at once formed a Christian 
association, or church, of a hundred and twenty 
members, proceeded, after solemn deliberation 
and prayer, to supply the vacancy in their num- 
ber created by the death of Judas, and remained 
in readiness for the miraculous manifestations 
of the Pentecost, which occurred ten days after- 
wards. In accordance with this view, St. Paul, 
quoting with reference to Christ the passage, 



THE ASCENSION. 139 

" He ascended up on high, he led captivity cap- 
tive, and gave gifts unto men," enumerates among 
those gifts " apostles, prophets, evangelists, pas- 
tors, and teachers." 

I now invite you, first, to consider with me 
the appropriateness of our Saviour's ascension, 
regarded as the close of his ministry, and then 
to draw from this event some of the heads of 
religious instruction which it is adapted to fur- 
nish. 

Suppose the case to have been otherwise. 
Suppose that Jesus had remained permanently 
upon the earth. In that event, the church could 
have had no distinct and independent existence, 
but would have been inseparable from him. He, 
the heaven-born, the infallible, so far transcended 
all human teachers, that none would have thought 
the new religion adequately represented where 
he was not. His bodily presence would have so 
marked the spot where he sojourned as the radiat- 
ing point of peculiar light and special privilege, 
that those who should have gone forth as his mes- 
sengers to distant provinces and countries would 
have labored under the greatest disadvantages 
and burdens. None would have deemed them- 
selves sufficiently instructed without listening for 
themselves to the great Teacher. Nor would the 
apostles, while he was at their head, have felt a 
sufficient self-confidence for their work. They 
would have relied on his countenance and advice 



140 THE ASCENSION. 

from day to day, and would not have trusted 
themselves to draw inferences or to apply princi- 
ples, without direct recourse to him. His earthly 
presence after a certain period would have con- 
strained and embarrassed them, because it was a 
presence necessarily confined to one place, while 
their field of missionary labor was the world. 
Therefore, said he, "- It is expedient for you that 
I go away ; for, if I go not away, the Comforter 
will not come, — the spirit of trust, courage, and 
energy will not enter your souls, — but if I de- 
part, I will send that spirit to you." By going 
from them, he gave them, in lieu of a revelation 
which they would never have deemed complete 
while he was among them to add to it, a fin- 
ished, perfect testimony, — an example, which 
they could contemplate in its wholeness and 
symmetry, — a life, which they could regard as 
a fixed and unchangeable centre of light for 
all times and all men. He gave them, in place 
of an earthly presence, of which they must often 
have regretted the withdrawal, a spiritual pres- 
ence, which they could feel always and every- 
where. He assumed the only position from 
which he could fulfil his promise, — " Lo ! I 
am with you always, even to the end of the 
world." 

But why might not his body have been again 
laid in the tomb, and seen corruption ? We an- 
swer, that his victory over death would in that 



THE ASCENSION. 141 

case have seemed partial and temporary. There 
would have hung about his memory associations 
of frailty and decay which it would have been 
hard to throw off. He could not have been 
regarded with the full and lofty confidence with 
which we now look to him as the conqueror of 
death, and our forerunner to life eternal. It was 
needful that Christ, being once raised from the 
dead, should die no more. And it was equally 
needful that he should pass away from the earth 
in such a mode as to inspire with courage his 
then faint-hearted followers, and to fix indelibly 
in their minds the assurance that he had come 
from God, and gone to God. 

The mode of our Saviour's ascension is in 
oeautiful harmony with the tone of his spirit, 
and the whole character of his life. We have 
in the Old Testament a like scene (yet how un- 
like !) in the translation of Elijah. He was a 
stern, awful old man. His life was passed in 
open, single-handed conflict with the banded 
thousands of idolatry and sin. Tlie eyrie of 
the mountain-bird was his resting-place, the 
fierce forest-winds howled about his path, and 
the jagged lightning was the lamp of liis feet. 
Nurtured among the rudest scenes of nature, 
ever planted with iron front and lowering brow 
in the evil ways of men, he seemed an embodi- 
ment of the untempered justice and fearful dis- 
pleasure of Heaven against sinners ; and when 



142 THE ASCENSION. 

he stood face to face with the priests of Baal 
on Mount Carmel, not the scathed cliffs of the 
mountain, or the angry sea-swell breaking over 
its base, presented features of rough and awful 
grandeur to be compared with the countenance 
and mien of the indignant seer. Fit was it, that, 
when his conflicts ceased, he shoiild be rapt away 
in a whirlwind, and borne aloft in a chariot of 
fire. 

Far otherwise did the Saviour rise to heaven ; 
for his whole life was gentle. Of him was it 
written (and how truly !) — " He shall not strive, 
nor cry. The bruised reed shall he not break, 
the smoking flax shall he not quench." His 
walk had been by the beautiful lake and over the 
vine-clad hills ; his lessons had been drawn from 
the blooming valleys and the rejoicing birds ; and 
in the desert bread had grown beneath his touch, 
and the sea had become calm when it bore him 
on its bosom. And now, in the rosy dawn of a 
beautiful spring morning, he gathers his chosen 
ones in the streets of Jerusalem. He goes out 
through the same gate, and by the vine-embow- 
ered path, on which he had walked, with the 
same eleven, beneath the full midnight moon, 
from the paschal supper to the garden of Geth- 
semane, and talked to them, as he went, of the 
heavenly vine and its fruitful branches. He goes 
up the same hill that had borne witness to his 
agony, and been moistened by his bloody sweat. 



THE ASCENSION. 143 

Before him lies the scene of his conflict and his 
triumph. Hard by is the home of the faithful 
sisters where he had been anointed for his burial, 
— the tomb whence he had called forth the sleep- 
ing Lazarus, — the new sepulclire where he had 
been laid with weeping, and where the resurrec- 
tion angel had rolled the stone away. He lifts 
up his hands and blesses his disciples ; arid while 
he speaks, the morning cloud parts, he rises and 
passes from their sight, and those hands still 
outstretched in blessing disappear. So calm, so 
glad, are all the influences of the scene, that 
the disciples feel not their bereavement as when 
he died. The blessing has sunk into their hearts, 
and they go back to Jerusalem with great joy; 
for they remember those words, — " Where I am, 
there ye shall be also." They realize the ful- 
filment of that which before they understood 
not, — " Wliither I go ye know, and the way 
ye know." 

" Thus calmly, slowly, did he rise 
In^o his native skies, 
His human form dissolved on high 
In its own radiancy." 

He rose to heaven, we say. What, or where, 
heaven is, we indeed know not. We know not 
how far it is to be regarded as local, and how far 
as all-pervading, like the presence of God. But 
we cannot help thinking of it as in some sense 
away from earth, and, if so, up, — up beyond the 



144 THE ASCENSION. 

clouds, where the sun grows not dim^ where 
shadows gather not. Beneath, all around, there 
is violence, sin, and suffering, mists hang, and 
darkness broods ; and men, in all ages and under 
all religions, have looked up for the dwelling of 
God and the home of the blessed, thus giving as 
it were the consent of the race in the tacit belief, 
that, while God is here and everywhere, and his 
glorified children may go wherever he dwells, 
there yet are up beyond our sight regions of the 
universe where he is beheld with clearer vision 
and worshipped with purer joy. We are so 
made, that our holiest thoughts always mount, 
— our best aspirations are all upward. It is an 
association with space, of which, reason against 
it as we may, we cannot divest ourselves ; and to 
this irresistible tendency of our minds the scene 
before us is adapted. It connects our Saviour's 
translation from human sight, and his peculiar 
dwelling, with all that is pure, holy, and hopeful 
in our hearts. It lifts our desires from passing 
scenes and grovelling pursuits. It creates for 
our faith a loftier, purer, brighter atmosphere. 
It blends with our own prospects for eternity 
every elevated association that can be borrowed 
from the fields of space. It places heaven in 
direct contrast with the grave. That is down, 
beneath men's feet ; heaven is on high. The 
two have nothing in common ; but, in the light 
of the resurrection morning, death has lost his 
sting and the grave its victory. 



THE ASCENSION. 145 

Let lis now give heed to some of the lessons 
which the ascension affords for our faith and 
Christian edification. 

Our Saviour, though God-born and heaven- 
descended, is always placed before us as the pat- 
tern of suffering, sanctified, glorified humanity. 
As he was, so are we in the world. As he is, 
so shall we be, if found in his image. He is the 
forerunner ; we, his followers. We are to follow 
him in death, — then to be partakers of his resur- 
rection, — then, of his ascension ; and his ascen- 
sion is but the consummation of his death and 
resurrection. The whole is but one act, divided 
in his case into three separate stages, that we 
may contemplate each by itself, and may connect 
tlie latter stages of glory with the first of pain, 
agony, and decay. Calvary, Joseph's tomb, and 
the ascension mount lay close together, and in 
our faith they are one. When Jesus died, he 
could not but rise again ; when he rose, he could 
not but go home to the Father. But he, when 
he rose, took again his own body, to show that 
lie still lived ; and he ascended in that same 
form to heaven, to show that the true home of 
the dead is not in the grave, but above. Thus is 
it with the disciple. Death, resurrection, ascen- 
sion, are the three stages of his passage hence. 
The body dies and sees corruption ; — the soul 
rises from the worn and useless tabernacle of 
clay, and ascends to God who gave it. 

13 



146 THE ASCENSION. 

Sucli are the associations which our Saviour's 
last days ought to connect with the death of the 
righteous. But how prone we are to let our 
thoughts linger on the first stage of the passage, 
— on the mere outward habiliments of death, — 
without remembering that all these were around 
liim who rose and went on high ! 

We say that we believe that our good friends 
have gone to heaven. But still the death-scene 
oppresses us, and often clothes our souls in im- 
penetrable gloom. We must, indeed, deeply feel 
their absence from us, the loss of their counsel 
or society, of their endeared countenances and 
their ministries of love. But suppose that the 
friend whom we mourn, instead of having pressed 
the bed of languishing, and breathed out his life 
in convulsive sighs, had gone from our sight as 
Jesus went, and we had traced with our own 
eyes the bright path on which he ascended, — 
I can hardly conceive of oppressive sadness and 
bitter weeping on his behalf. Rather, because 
we loved our friend, should we rejoice that he 
had gone to the Father. We should feel thank- 
ful for him that his days of conflict and sorrow 
had ceased, and our surviving affection would 
breathe in the hope of meeting him in his radi- 
ant home, when our own summons came. 

Such associations we, as Christians, ought to 
connect with the death of our Christian friends ; 
for the death of the believer in Jesus is his as- 



THE ASCENSION. 147 

cension, — veiled, indeed, from the outward vis- 
ion, but to be recognized by the eye of faith. 
But the most spiritual of us do not regard death 
as we should, had we our dwelling in a purely 
Christian community. We view it too much 
through the medium transmitted from pagan 
times and regions, and let in upon us from 
the unchristian portion of the world around 
us. Suppose, however, a community in which 
there was no person of mature years, who was 
not in heart and life a disciple of Jesus, and 
imagine a death in such a society. As I bring 
the scene before me, the death-chamber seems 
like the mount of the ascension, and every one 
says, — " It is good to be here." I see no agony 
of grief, no look of despair, by the 'bedside ; but 
survivors unite with the dying saint in praise 
and thanksgiving ; and their adieus are full of 
congratulations with him that he is counted 
worthy to be first summoned from the outer 
courts to the inner temple of his God. When 
the spirit has fled, I hear those that remain 
talking of him who has gone as no less one of 
the family than before, and as only having pre- 
ceded them by a little way, to make ready the 
new mansion for them all to dwell in when the 
earthly house shall be dissolved. At the inter- 
ment I hear no sad knell, I see no sable proces- 
sion, no pomp of woe ; but the dust is laid in 
kindred dust with solemn joy, and with hymns 



148 THE ASCENSION. 

of gratitude to Christ, the resurrection and the 
life. Thus will the death of the innocent and 
holy seem to us now, in the precise proportion 
in which we borrow our views, not from the dark, 
cold philosophy of the irreligious world, but from 
the Gospel and life of our dying, risen, ascended 
Redeemer. 

To pass to another head of instruction, we 
have seen that it was expedient for the disci- 
ples, that Jesus, after he had finished his testi- 
mony and wrought his work, should go away 
from them, in order that they might put forth 
energies which would have continued latent had 
he remained with them, — that they might be 
equal to duties and services beyond their dar- 
ing while he visibly held the chief place and as- 
sumed the heaviest burdens. Thus is it often 
with those human friends through whom God 
gives us faithful counsels, pure examples, and 
holy influences. Up to a certain point, their 
presence educates, strengthens, and blesses us ; 
beyond that point, it often restrains and depresses 
our own independent energies. We shrink into 
their shadows. We roll every burden upon them. 
We will not think ourselves adequate to any high 
or arduous effort, while they are with us. We 
assume nothing, while they have strength to do 
and bear everything. It is, therefore, no doubt, 
hard as the saying sounds, expedient for us that 
they should go away. Bereavement often calls 



THE ASCENSION. 149 

out inward powers and resources previously un- 
known. Those who had felt, while their main 
earthly staff was left them, tliat they were weak, 
and lame, and unable to stand or move alone, 
when deprived of that whereon they leaned, 
often find themselves strengthened as by an 
unseen hand, and can forthwith " walk, and 
leap, and glorify God." When those who were 
as eyes to the blind and as feet to the lame 
are removed, how often are the sealed eyes 
opened, and the feeble feet made firm ! We 
all have indefinitely large capacities of action, 
effort, and endurance, but wait to hear the call 
and feel the impulse before we put them forth ; 
and they too often lie unused till the departure 
of those who seemed the most essential members 
of our domestic and social circles pushes us into 
the foremost rank, and, while it imposes fresh 
and high responsibilities, endues us at the same 
time with both the will and the power to dis- 
charge them. Death is thus not only the mower 
of sheaves ripe for the harvest, but the great 
ripener of character ; for, by removing some 
plants, it is constantly exposing others to the 
influences needful for their maturity. 

We may see numerous illustrations of these 
remarks in communities both secular and relig- 
ious, where the very men who are tlie first to 
raise the cry, — " Help, Lord, for the faithful 
fail, the godly cease," — soon find themselves, to 

13* 



150 THE ASCENSION. 

their own amazenieiit, inspired and furnished for 
the places of those wliom they mourn. We see 
the same principle often exemplified in domestic 
life. The mother, who, while her husband lived, 
had scarcely energy and self-confidence enough 
for her own gentle sway, when left sole parent, is 
enabled to fill the double office with vigor and with 
wisdom, through the helping spirit of the wid- 
ow's God and Judge. Thus is it that from the 
saddest of all God's dispensations flow the high- 
est results, mental and spiritual, in the enlarge- 
ment of the capacity and sphere of duty of those 
whose circle is visited by a bereaving Providence. 
The gospel of the ascension suggests yet an- 
other lesson. Gethsemane, the garden of agony, 
and Bethany, the scene of the ascension, lie close 
together on the Mount of Olives. The same air 
that had borne the sighs and groans of that night 
of sorrow was parted by the glorious form as it 
rose to heaven. Thus is it in common life. The 
moimt of ascension is no separate spot, hallowed 
from the approach of grief or the conflict of doubt 
and fear. But the death of the righteous every- 
where consecrates scenes of sadness and suffer- 
ing, of privation and agony, marking them as 
spots nearest heaven. The spirit of Christian- 
ity here differs widely from that of all other 
modes of faith. They set apart, fence in, crown 
with splendid monuments, scenes made glorious 
by the victories and daring exploits of outwardly 



THE ASCENSION. 151 

illustrious men. The Christian shrines are those 
of suffering or of lowly toil. The church com- 
memorated the Saviour's death long before it 
kept the festival of his birth ; and no scenes in 
his disciple's life are fraught with so intense an 
interest as those where he has passed through 
the fire-baptism of sorrow, waged decisive con- 
flicts with the powers of evil, and risen, in the 
serene might of faith and trust, above outward 
misery and suffering. When Jesus prayed in 
agony, the glory that awaited him rose before his 
view, and gave him strength to bear and over- 
come ; for the Scriptures tell us that he, " for 
the joy that was set before him, endured the 
cross, and despised the shame." The dark hours 
of the crucifixion were before him ; but there 
played also before his vision the majesty and 
glory of his return to God, — of his new birth 
into the kingdom of heaven. Are scenes of se- 
vere or sorrowful discipline appointed to any 
of us ? Are we depressed by penury, bowed 
down by infirmity, bereft of cherished kindred 
and bosom friends ? Are we compelled to move 
on beneath clouds, and on a painful pt^th ? From 
this path we may ascend to God, — through these 
clouds lies the way to heaven. For us, as for our 
Lord, may the same scenes be those of conflict 
and of triumph, of agony and glory, of our bow- 
ing under earth's heaviest burdens and mounting 
to heaven's purest joys. 



152 THE ASCENSION. 

Finally, there is in the narrative of our Sav- 
iour's ascension a lesson of Christian activity and 
zeal for all of us who call ourselves his disciples. 
When he went on high, it was not the apostles 
alone, the official heads of the church, but the 
whole hundred and twenty, the entire body of be- 
lievers, that came forward to assume the charge 
thus devolved from the Master upon his follow- 
ers. And in the labors and sacrifices of the in- 
fant church all that believed bore part. All felt 
that they stood in a place of duty no less than of 
privilege, — that they were to enlarge, enrich, 
adorn, the sanctuary, instead of nestling idly be- 
hind its curtain-folds. Every Christian deemed 
himself endowed with an apostle's commission to 
honor in life, and to diffuse by faithful effort, the 
Gospel which he had found precious. Should it 
not be so now ? The Divine Teacher is with us 
only through his pervading and always blessing 
spirit. He has left his whole work of reclaiming 
sinners and bringing in eternal righteousness to 
human instrumentality ; and not to one or an- 
other order of men, but to all, his command is, 
— " Freely ye have received, freely give." The 
preaching of the Gospel belongs to you no less 
than to me, though in a different way. You, who 
profess yourselves Christians, are bound to relig- 
ious zeal and effort by the law of self-consistency. 
In advancing your favorite secular enterprises, 
opinions, and measures, you never content your- 



THE ASCENSION. 153 

selves with the services of leaders or of official 
persons. You sustain their hands and encour- 
age their hearts. You tender them your efficient 
co-operation. You make their special work your 
frequent work. Yet, Christian, in the cause 
wliich you profess to regard as above all oth- 
ers, where are the footmarks of your activity, 
where the goings forth of your zeal ? In what 
form or way have you left traces of your handi- 
work in tlie spiritual temple ? Where are the 
religious charities which you have helped admin- 
ister, — the tempted and endangered whom you 
have led to Christ, — the hungering souls for 
whom you have broken the bread of life ? Are 
tliere not some in our household of faith who 
bear not these marks of the Lord Jesus ? You 
indeed help employ the religious services of one 
for a thousand souls. But what is he, and what 
are his services, among so many ? As the organ 
of public devotion, as the sympathizing friend of 
a limited circle of the tempted, poor, and grief- 
stricken, he may, indeed, do much, yet not a tithe 
of what demands to be done. He needs you all 
as fellow- workers. Every Christian should be a 
preacher of righteousness, a minister of the Gos- 
pel, keeping tliis one interest prominent through 
the cares and duties of daily life, remembering 
tlie high calling of Christ Jesus while engaged 
in tlie labors of his secular calling, watching for 
avenues of religious usefulness, and, above all, 



154 THE ASCENSION. 

guarding with prayerful vigilance the silent out- 
flow of his example, which, if not made holy and 
sanctifying, can hardly fail to wound the cause 
of Christ and to weaken the hold of his religion 
on the hearts of men. Thus consecrating our- 
selves to the duties as well as to the joys of piety, 
to the burdens no less than to the privileges of 
the Christian life, we may realize the fulfilment 
of the early recorded blessing, — ",Tlie liberal 
soul shall be enriched, and he that watereth 
shall be watered also himself." 



SERMON XII 



SOURCES or CONSOLATION. 

LET NOT TOUll HEART BE TROUBLED, NEITHER LET IT BE 

AFRAID. — John xiv. 27. 

Yet said the same Teacher, — "In the world 
ye shall have tribulation " ; and who passes or 
approaches the meridian of life without having 
felt it ? How few of our long-established homes 
have not been darkened by the wings of the 
death-angel ! And in those few, have there not 
been seasons of weary and perilous illness, of 
deep solicitude and agonizing suspense on ac- 
count of the tenderly beloved? To this heri- 
tage of certain sorrow must our young friends 
look forward, if they live. We would not abate 
aught from the buoyancy of their hopes. Nay, 
we would assure them, that, if they forsake not 
the law and covenant of their God, they have 
happy lives before them, — happy, yet not cloud- 
less. Their path will sometimes be under a dark- 
ened sky, — their rest in homes made desolate. 



156 SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 

But "in the prospect or the endurance of these 
sorrows, there come to us the words of Jesus, — 
" Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be 
afraid." And he who utters these words alone 
can enable us fully to verify them in our experi- 
ence. I now ask your attention to the Christian 
relief and remedy for those fears and sorrows that 
flow from our domestic relations and affections. 

In seasons of anxiety in behalf of those whom 
we love, or of sorrow for their removal from us, 
we need most of all a firm and active faith in 
God as our Father and their Father, and as or- 
dering all the events of their lives and of ours in 
infinite love. It is not enougli that we say to 
ourselves, — "These sad events are a necessary 
part of the course of nature." We shall feel it 
a grievous burden to dwell where such necessity 
gives law. The thought that these things must 
needs be gives no consolation, but only clothes 
our sky in new gloom. Nor can yet any reason- 
ing on general laws meet the wants of the soul 
at such a season. The idea of laws of nature, 
omnipotent, irreversible, crushing, — of a system 
in the main beneficent, which yet has its hard 
cases and its victims, — weighs down the spirit 
as with an iron hand. In connection with this 
idea, there always comes up the torturing ques- 
tion, — " Could not the issue that has taken place 
have been foreseen and averted, had we been 
more watchful and more wise ? " The only con- 



SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 157 

ception which can satisfy the deep want of the 
soul in sorrow is that of an impartial, all-merci- 
ful Providence, under whose administration there 
is no wanton infliction, no aimless suffering, no 
event which it is not best for us to meet and bear. 
We need that faith in the Father which shall re- 
fer the trial to no second cause, to the uncon- 
trolled working of no material law, but solely to 
the merciful purpose of one who wounds but to 
heal, whose very rod comforts while it chastens. 
True, we may not always discern at the moment 
the appointed ministry of sorrow. Nor yet can 
our children always discern the reasons and the 
wisdom of the measures which we take for their 
good. And, in the strength and pride of man- 
hood, we must feel that in God's hands we are 
still children, often ignorant of our true good, 
craving the outward blessings which might send 
leanness into our souls, shrinking from the waters 
in which alone wo can receive our true spiritual 
baptism. 

But how are we to acquire and sustain this 
filial faith ? I know not, except through our 
Saviour. It is easy, indeed, in the summer 
weather of health and prosperity, to take in 
bright views of the Creator's love from the 
most radiant leaves of tlie book of nature and 
of Providence ; but in the hour of deep solici- 
tude or sorrow, the eye rests upon gloomier rec- 
ords. As we attempt to trace the Father's coun- 

14 



158 SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 

tenance, clouds and darkness are round about 
liim, — his way is in the sea, his judgments are 
past finding out. There come up before our 
minds the fearful analogies of nature, the fierce 
and mysterious agencies that deal desolation and 
death, the appalling forms of wretchedness and 
suffering always to be witnessed among men ; and 
it is impossible for us so to direct our trains of 
thought among the mixed and clouded scenes of 
the outward world, as to call up the cheerful, 
hopeful associations which we need. Indeed, the 
aspects of nature and of life are so infinitely va- 
ried, that they can hardly fail to reflect the mood 
of the mind for the time being. Then, too, there 
is a prostration of spirit, which prevents our tak- 
ing those large, discursive \dews, and indulging 
in those tasteful speculations, which amuse and 
delight our happier hours. Sorrow, while it 
touches to the finest issues every portion of the 
moral nature, leaves the mind too little elasticity 
and enterprise to reason out its own sources of 
consolation from the conflicting aspects and jar- 
ring voices of the world around. 

We need, then, to be, as it were, taken by the 
hand, and led directly to the Father, by some 
elder brother, who has entered more deeply into 
the secret of his love, and who dwells in his 
bosom. This Jesus does for us. When he tells 
us of the loving-kindness of God, we feel tliat he 
speaks of that which he knows, and testifies of 



SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 159 

that which he has seen. We behold him moving 
on in a dark and ever-darkening path, yet serene 
and happy, because the Father was with him. 
While we see in his works the seal of his com- 
mission from on high, his tranquil, resigned, sub- 
missive, yet fervent and energetic spirit, concil- 
iates our confidence, — pleads- with our hearts to 
believe and trust him. His words seem no less 
divine than if uttered in our own ears by a voice 
from heaven. Take all else away, cloud over 
every outward scene, shut out every secondary 
source of consolation, yet leave us those last con- 
versations and prayers of Jesus with his disciples, 
and leave us with and in them a vivid conception 
of the man of sorrows and of glory ; and we 
have enough for comfort, support, and hope. 
With those divine words, with that benignant 
countenance, the express image of the Father's, 
we can go down into the valley of tribulation 
without doubt, murmur, or complaint, assured of 
the guidance and protection in wliich he trusted 
and rejoiced. 

Again, in our seasons of sorrow, we need the 
kind of sympathy which Jesus alone can fully be- 
stow, — the sympathy of one who has both en- 
dured and conquered, who has fathomed and sur- 
mounted the depths of earthly grief, and who, 
from his own experience, can say to us, — "Be 
of good cheer ; I have overcome the world." 
Among our friends we cling for consolation 



160 SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 

chiefly to those who have also suffered ; and 
no countenance beams upon us so full of com- 
fort as that marked with the lines of deep and 
frequent sorrow, yet bearing the impress of relig- 
ious peace, of heavenly communings, and high 
spiritual joy. We read our own appointed his- 
tory in the face of such a friend. We see the 
ever-brightening path, with its glorious issues, of 
those who through much tribulation are to enter 
the kingdom of God. In Jesus we behold sorrow 
in its beauty and its blessedness. We learn in 
him that it has no harsh ministry, no vindictive 
purpose, but that whom the Lord loveth he chas- 
teneth ; for we know that the Father's love was 
no less entire and full for him, wlien he hung 
upon the cross, than ^\H^ien he was transfigured 
on the mountain. We see in him, that sorrow 
need not check the serene flow of holy and happy 
thoughts, — that the supreme good is not out- 
ward joy, but a soul at peace with God, and 
in harmony with heaven. And these lessons we 
learn from one of whose fellow-feeling with us we 
are all the while conscious. It is a blessed and 
sustaining thoiight, that our glorified fellow-suf- 
ferer is with us in our hour of trial, unchanged 
in love from the time when he wept at the tomb 
of Lazarus, and bore meekly the strifes, doubts, 
and fears of his still frail disciples. We go back 
in our musing to the days of his flesh. We re- 
call that scene, when he, the conqueror of death, 



SOL'RCES OF CONSOLATION. 161 

stands bowed in the tendcrest sympathy with the 
sorrow wliich he is so soon to change into glad- 
ness. We ponder every word of that interview 
with the kind sisters, — a season no less memora- 
ble for the opening of the depths of a heart full 
of divine compassion, than for its stupendous 
miracle of omnipotent mercy. The words of 
that hour sink into our hearts, as though heard 
by the outward ear, and give us new strength 
to bear the cross in our Saviour's name and 
spirit. 

Once more, in our seasons of sorrow, we need 
a clear, firm, elastic, available faith in immortal- 
ity, in the eternity of our affections, and in the 
deathless union of those whom death has parted. 
This faith is not to be derived in its sufficiency 
and fulness from mere analogies of nature, or 
from that instinctive desire of life which is proof 
of nothing beyond itself. When everything smiles 
around us, it is easy to read in the swelling bud 
and the transfigured earth-worm the assurance 
that man will not wholly and for ever slumber 
in the grave. But those who have delighted the 
most in these correspondences of the outward and 
the spiritual find them inadequate in their hour 
of need. They are precious in their place and 
for their use. They serve to spiritualize nature, 
to draw voices of praise and love from her perish- 
ing forms, and to bring nearer to the heart the 
"incorruptible spirit" that is in all things. But 

14* 



162 SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 

when a friend goes from iis and passes behind the 
veil, we crave something more definite. We long 
to see the veil parted. We long for a voice to 
break the eternal silence, and to assure us that 
the departed indeed live, — that, though dead, 
they live. We look upon the countless genera- 
tions that have followed each other to the grave ; 
and, if we can see no sign from the spirit-land, if 
none have ever returned, none brought tidings 
from the home to wliich they have been gath- 
ered, oh, it is not within the scope of a painted 
flower-cup or an insect's wing, nor yet of a con- 
sciousness and experience which have no future, 
to proclaim to us a truth so vast and world- 
embracing as man's immortality. From the to- 
kens and emblems of dissolution, we turn, then, 
to the gates of Nain, — we listen for the voice, 
"Young man, arise!" — we see the cold form 
stirred again with the breath of life, — the sealed 
eyes look upon the face of the Lord, — the dead 
lives ; and the shout of the rejoicing multitude, 

— " God hath visited and redeemed his people," 

— rings in our ears, and makes melody in our 
hearts, as we sit in our desolate homes, or bend 
at the grave-side. 0, blessed be our Father, that 
this voice of power has been uttered upon earth, 
that the caverns of the grave have been unsealed 
and its kingdom shaken, that the omnipotent fiat 
has swept over the valley of death in the sight 
of the living, that the long procession of the dy- 



SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 163 

ing has been met and turned back by the Lord 
of life ! 

My young friends who have not known the bit- 
terness of sorrow, I beg you, think not lightly 
of these miracles. Think not with easy com- 
placency of teachers who come in their own 
names, and would tell you that Jesus came in 
his, — who would turn the record of his mighty 
works into a fable, and make his resurrection a 
lie. This self-sustaining theology may seem good 
to you while your mountain stands firm. It im- 
poses no severe restraints. It lays upon you 
no crushing load of duty. It flatters your self- 
Bsteem. It chimes in with the natural tendency, 
which none overcome without a struggle, to seek 
the consciousness of being good without any very 
earnest effort to be good. But wait till the clouds 
gather and the floods come. "Wait till one dearer 
than your own life lies dead at your side, and 
your grief darkens for you every scene of nature 
and of life, and muffles into sepulchral tones 
every gay and hopeful voice from the outward 
world. I pray that you may then know the 
worth of your Saviour's miracles and the power 
of his resurrection. I more than pity you, if, 
at that hour, the death-awakening voice of Jesus 
does not kindle in your hearts a humble, thank- 
ful faith. 

It is not, then, the wisdom of the wise, but the 
words and works, the death and resurrection, of 



164 SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 

Christ alone, that can give us the consolation and 
support that we need in our seasons of sorrow. 
Within a few days I have reperused the corre- 
spondence of Cicero, with reference to the death 
of his accomplished and tenderly beloved daugh- 
ter. He, in his luxurious leisure, had written 
eloquently about immortality. But now all his 
dreams of a happy future have fled, and his soul 
is utterly desolate. " Public employment alone," 
he says, " can afford resource or consolation ; and 
the opportunity for that is cut off by the distract- 
ed state of the conunonwealth." There remains 
for him, therefore, only hopeless grief and rem- 
ediless despair. On thus seeing how absolutely 
nothing the accumulated wisdom of four thou- 
sand years could do towards healing the sorrows 
of one who had it all at his command, I felt more 
than ever our boundless debt of gratitude to Him 
who has abolished death, and brought life and 
immortality to light. When the bereaved parent 
asks, in agony. Where is my child ? nature and 
philosophy only echo back the question with a 
more desponding emphasis. Jesus alone has an- 
swered it. Only the garden where they laid him 
yields us spring-flowers to strew upon the graves 
of our kindred. He shall wipe all tears from our 
eyes, and bring our souls, if found in his faith 
and spirit, unto undying communion with those 
whom he has taken to himself. And while we, 
and those who have gone from us, surround the 



SOURCES OF CONSOLATION. 165 

throne with our hosannas, we shall own, with 
higher evidence than we can now perceive, that 
death is the angel of divine love, and the grave 
the gate of heaven. 



SERMON XIII 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 

FATHER, I WILL THAT THEY ALSO WHOM THOU HAST GIVEN 
ME BE WITH ME WHERE I AM. — John Xvii. 24. 

For many from our households has this prayer 
been fulfilled, and we profess no doubt that it 
has been. Yet does our tone of feeling with ref- 
erence to the pure and good that have gone from 
us fully correspond with our belief? Far be it 
from me to chide sorrow for the departed. I, 
too, well know what it is, — how keen is the 
first agony of bereavement, — how protracted, 
long after all outward traces of grief have passed 
away, is the sense of disappointment and deso- 
lation. But, aside from all consciousness of per- 
sonal privation and loss, our views of death are 
affected in part by the unchristian notions and 
feelings with regard to it entertained by many 
with whom we are daily conversant, and in part 
by the frequency with which we see removed 
from life persons whose characters suggest no 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 167 

happy or liopcful associations in connection with 
their immortality There are some denomina- 
tions of Christians, — the Moravians and Sweden- 
borgians, for instance, — that seem to approach 
much nearer than others to the true tone of feel- 
ing with regard to death. But I cannot find that 
on this subject they believe anything which we 
do not. The reason why they can the more fully 
realize in experience what they believe is, that 
they are bodies of Christians seldom joined ex- 
cept by sincere believers, and that they keep 
themselves very much within their own respec- 
tive households of faith, so that their trusting 
and hopeful spirit for the dead is exposed to 
fewer counteracting influences than can be the 
case with us. This seclusion from the general 
intercourse of the world, though pleasant in 
some of its aspects, is not, it seems to me, to 
be desired or sought by the Christian. ^' I pray 
not," said our Saviour, " that thou shouldest 
take them out of the world, but that thou should- 
est keep them from the evil." More of the lux- 
ury of faith and devotion might, no doubt, be 
enjoyed in these close Christian corporations ; 
but by the discipline of the great world, and 
by the opportunities of religious influence which 
it presents, there is a much larger amount of 
duty to be performed, and a much higher point 
of spiritual attainment to be reached. 

Let us, at this time, gather up some of the 



168 CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 

views of death and eternity, which may give us 
consolation in the departure of those for whom 
the prayer of our text has been fulfilled. 

In the first place, we cannot help regarding 
those who have been called to the heavenly so- 
ciety as happy in the season of their removal. 
It is fit, indeed, that death should be attended 
with circumstances of pain and dread, — else 
the weary and afflicted would hasten to drop 
the burden of life before their time. But if 
there be a world beyond, for each soul there 
must be a time of translation ; and can we 
doubt that God's time is the right and the 
best time ? There must be a moment when 
this world ceases to be the fittest scene of dis- 
cipline for the improving spirit. Heaven reaps 
a large harvest from the most brilliant promise 
of early life ; but is it not well that the fruit 
first ripe should be first gathered ? The cum- 
berer of the ground may be left year after year, 
so long as there remains even a germ of spiritual 
life ; for even in autumn that germ may bud 
and blossom, and if it finally dies within him, 
it is by his own act, not by God's. He may be 
left, too, as a discipline for the faith, patience, 
and charity of others, and may not be removed 
till his moral desolation and penury have helped 
many to seek the wealth which he has despised. 
The good and faithful may also be spared long, 
not only because they are needjed here, but be- 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 169 

cause they may still gain and grow continually, 
and without check, from the means of progress 
here open to them. Others may early exhaust, 
for their own peculiar habits of mind and heart, 
the earthly resources designed for their culture. 
Being made perfect in a short time, they have 
fulfilled a long time. Their souls pleased the 
Lord, — therefore hasted he to take them away. 
Some shrink with too much sensitiveness from 
the unavoidable trials and conflicts of their' 
earthly life, and at the same time every fibre 
of their moral natures is in harmony with 
heaven. Why, then, should the Good Shep- 
herd leave them in bleak places, when his own 
green pastures by the still waters are the very 
rest they crave ? Many are taken from the evil 
to come, from trials which might have crushed 
instead of strengthening them, from burdens 
which would have weighed too heavily upon 
their souls. Others might have been exposed 
to less propitious moral influences, had they 
lived longer. Temptations might have thick- 
ened around them, — worldly, selfish aims might 
have dimmed the beauty of their early promise. 
Of many a young man cut down, in what we 
call untimely death, when just leaving a relig- 
ious home for unsheltered scenes of moral evil 
and jeopardy, may it be said, as of the patri- 
arch Enoch, — " He pleased God and was be- 
loved of liim, so that, living among sinners, he 

15 



170 CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 

was translated. Yea, speedily was he taken 
away, lest that wickedness should alter his un- 
derstanding, or deceit beguile his soul." Hard 
as it is, when the heavenly guest is summoned 
from our own tables, to say, " Thy will be done ! " 
I cannot doubt, that in the condition of mind 
and character of every child that God calls home, 
whether in infancy, youth, or age, there is some- 
thing which renders the appointed time the best 
of all times for his translation, — that either a 
longer or a shorter life would have been attended 
with less happy results. 

For us who remain, also, must not our friends 
be taken in the best time ? Even if it be when 
they seem most needed here, may we not in- 
tensely need the flow of holier, more heaven- 
ward thoughts, of which sorrow unlocks the 
spring ? No doubt, our moral progress is at 
times arrested by causes beyond our power, — 
earthward and heavenly influences are so poised 
against each other, that with the utmost effort 
we barely hold our ground, and take no onward 
steps. Affliction disturbs this balance, and gives 
our better desires freer scope and more perfect 
issues. There is a conscious nearness to heaven, 
which belongs only to those who have seen their 
best beloved pass within its gates. There are 
home feelings connected with heaven, known 
only by those whose families are divided between 
the two worlds, which gain new strength with 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 171 

every new translation. When from our future 
life we look back upon tlie present, I doubt not 
that we shall see, that, of all our experiences, 
our sorrows were among the most precious, — 
that our seasons of bereavement and darkness 
were those when our souls most truly grew in 
divine strength and wisdom, when our best reso- 
lutions were fixed, our purest sentiments made 
abiding, our higher natures most nourished and 
enriched. By God's appointment we are to be 
made perfect through suffering ; and while the 
best may be rendered still better through its min- 
istry, and the aged saint may find it in his heart 
even to thank God for his afflictive mercies, we 
who are yet midway in the path of life, and in 
full conflict with every unspiritual tendency and 
influence, must own the fitness of those events 
which most clearly reveal to us our true calling 
and our highest good. 

Thoughts of heaven might, it seems to me, 
give us more consolation than we are wont to 
derive from that source. We employ, with re- 
gard to death a great deal of pagan imagery, 
which can hardly fail to let low and unworthy 
ideas into our minds. We talk of the blighting- 
of early promise, of the premature death of the 
young and the beautiful. We too often speak 
of the pure and the good that have gone from us, 
as if they were objects of pity. We regret for 
them the brief pleasures, the withering joys, of 



172 CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 

the passing days. And then our thoughts revert, 
oftener than a high Christian culture should per- 
mit, to the sad accompaniments of dissolution 
and the last lonely home of the frail tenement 
of clay, even as the caterpillar might look upon 
the torn covering of the chrysalis as all that re- 
mained of his fellow-worm, ignorant that the rent 
and forsaken tabernacle marked the higher birth 
of its tenant. But our faith tells us that to those 
to whom it was Christ to live, it is gain to die. 
Let our thoughts, then, linger not about the grave, 
but seek our kindred in the nearer presence of 
their Father and their Saviour, in the home where 
every holy wish is met and every pure desire ful- 
filled, where suffering and sorrow are no more, 
and life clothes itself in eternal youth and unfad- 
ing beauty. What would our brief joys be to 
those to whom all the avenues of divine wisdom 
are free, the riches of infinite love unfolded, and 
a boundless sphere of duty and of happiness laid 
open? 

• " How happy 

The holy spirits who wander there, 
'Mid flowers that shall never fade or fall ! 
Though mine were the gardens of earth and sea. 
Though the stars themselves had flowers for me, 
One blossom of heaven outblooms them all. 
Go, wing thy flight from star to star, 
From world to luminous world, as far 
As the universe spreads its flaming wall ; 
Take all the pleasures of all the spheres. 
And multiply each through endless years. 
One minute of heaven is worth them all." 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 173 

We know that our innocent children, our good 
friends, are happy, infinitely happy. Were they 
of a gentle and tender spirit, pure in heart, kind, 
peaceful, ever seeking the things that are more 
excellent ? Their communion now is only with 
the most congenial scenes and objects. Their 
souls shall no more hanger and thirst after right- 
eousness, as they often did under the infirmity 
and depression of earthly trial. Every pure taste, 
every kind affection, has found its kindred nutri- 
ment and joy. It is a kingdom prepared for them, 
adapted to meet their desires, to satisfy their long- 
ings, to fill their souls with the fulness of divine 
love. 

Immortality, in order to give us consolation, 
must not be looked at merely as a general truth. 
We must individualize it, and apply it to separate 
traits of character and forms of loveliness. It is 
not in one unvarying frame of spirit and routine 
of duty and joy that we must conceive of the re- 
deemed as living on for ever ; but of each as re- 
taining his own peculiar mental and moral fea- 
tures, so that, while all shine as the brightness of 
the firmament, they differ as one star differs from 
another in glory. Heaven undoubtedly presents 
various modes of activity and avenues of pro- 
gress, the tree of life bears divers kinds of fruit, 
corresponding to the different combinations of 
worthy and heavenly elements of character with 
which different souls pass into their higher state. 

15* 



174 CONSOLING VIEWS OP DEATH. 

Wlien I think of the kindred and friends who 
may welcome me to heaven, I want to think not 
of any precise number of angelic beings, alike 
except in their degrees of attainment, — I would 
bring them up in their individual forms and fea- 
tures, in those delicate hues and blendings of 
character, those traits of loveliness to be felt, 
yet not oiescribed, which linger always on our 
memories. And as their tones of voice still dwell 
upon our hearts, and their countenances are ever 
living there, why need we suppose that even these 
in their individuality have passed away, that is, 
so far as the soul gave them shape and utterance ? 
The tongue, the face, is indeed for ever cold and 
dead. But in some form or way spirits must be 
manifest to, and hold converse with, one another. 
Why, then, may not some likeness to the earthly 
countenance and voice (at least so far as to pro- 
duce sameness of impression) survive in whatever 
form of life the translated spirit may assume, so 
that, when friends meet friends in heaven, there 
may be something in their so widely different 
mode of existence to recall even the looks and 
tones through which they had known each other 
here ? 

These are not merely idle speculations. We 
want not only to know, but to feel, that our friends 
are in heaven and are happy ; and the more vivid 
the conception that we can form of their present 
state, the stronger and more availing will be our 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 175 

heart-faith in their happiness. The great dif- 
ficulty lies in conceiving of them as still living. 
Our thoughts keep running back to the time when 
they were with us, and to the parting scene, as if 
that were the end of all. But if we are permit- 
ted to take them in our thoughts, as they were 
in tlieir individual traits of character, with every 
beautiful and lovely look and tone that we remem- 
ber, and to bear them thus unchanged to their 
place near the eternal throne, it helps us meditate 
upon their present condition. We can thus bring 
ourselves into vivid and delightful communion 
with those whom the curtain of death veils from 
us. They come up before us, as in the days of 
their health and hope, when " the secret of God 
was upon their tabernacle, and their glory was 
fresh within them." They come up, the child 
with his innocent brow, the young and the beauti- 
ful, the revered parent with that same benignant 
smile, so glowing and lifelike ; and as they stand 
before us in their redemption robes, hand seems 
again joined in hand, heart throbs with heart, theji 
commune with us of happy days gone by and of 
gladness yet to come, and when the vision breaks, 
we can almost hear the rustling of their garments 
as they go from us, and trace the line of living 
light on which they mount to heaven. 

Again, tlie feeling of entire and life-long sep- 
aration from our departed friends is one of the 
most bitter ingredients in our cup of sorrow. We 



176 CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 

could bear, with much cheerfulness of hope, their 
absence, their long absence, from us. Oceans or 
years may intervene between them and our em- 
brace, and still there is no settled sadness on their 
account ; for our love bridges over time and space, 
— they are living, — they are happy, — the months 
of separation will pass rapidly away. But as for 
those in heaven, we are apt to feel, that, so long 
as we live, they are necessarily remote from our 
intercourse and sympathy. Far otherwise, how- 
ever, is the spirit of our Saviour and of his re- 
ligion, which blends the worlds that seem so far 
apart. We may be nearer to the dead than to the 
absent. Where the dead are we know not, nor 
need we know. But that they and we are in the 
house of the same Father we do know, and we 
doubt not that they have free range through the 
house, and may revisit at pleasure the apartments 
where they used to dwell. The scenes, the dis- 
courses, the miracles, of the New Testament bring 
the dead very near the abodes of the living. An 
old English divine, speaking of the communion 
of the dead and the living, says : — " Little know 
we how little a way a soul hath to go to heaven, 
when it departs from the body. Whether it must 
pass locally through moon and sun and firmament, 
or whether that soul find new light in the same 
room, and be not carried into any other, but that 
the glory of heaven be diflPiised over all, I know 
not, I dispute not, I inquire not. Without dis- 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 177 

puting or inquiring, I know, that, when Christ 
says that God is not the God of the dead, he says 
that to assure me that those whom I call dead are 
alive. If the dead and we be not upon one floor, 
nor under one story, yet we are under one roof. 
We think not a friend lost because he is gone into 
another room, nor because he is gone into another 
land, and into another world no man is gone ; 
for that heaven which God created and this world 
is all one world. If I had fixed a son in court, 
or married my daughter into a plentiful for- 
tune, I were satisfied for that son and daughter. 
Shall I not be so, when the King of heaven hath 
taken that son to himself, and married himself to 
that daughter for ever? This is the faith that 
sustains me, when I lose by the death of others, 
or suffer by living in misery myself, that the dead 
and we are all now in one churqji, and at the res- 
urrection shall all be in one choir." The dead 
cannot be far from the living, nor can they cease 
to love them. Separated from us but by a thin 
veil, to them transparent, and almost so to our 
faith, they are the cloud of witnesses that com- 
pass us about, survey our path, and rejoice in our 
progress. Let us feel that they are with us in 
prayer and praise, in duty and devotion. Let 
the thought of their watchful love give us at once 
comfort and strength, — comfort for their depart- 
ure, — strength that we may follow them. 

The idea of the probable nearness of the de- 



178 CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 

parted to us now leads us naturally to speak of 
our reunion with them in heaven. This is to my 
mind inseparable from the doctrine of immortal- 
ity. I cannot conceive of the continued life of 
the same beings that live here, without the con- 
tinuance of those strong and tender affections 
which make so large a part of the occupation 
and the joy of life. I feel conscious that my 
love for the friends whom God has called away 
from me is an indestructible part of my charac- 
ter, and that to tear it from my soul would be to 
annihilate me, and substitute another being in 
my stead. But without this loss of my identity, 
I know that my happiness in heaven would be in- 
complete, unless I found myself consciously in 
the society of the pure and holy who have been 
taken from me. Do any stigmatize our earnest 
craving for the society of our friends in heaven 
as a selfish feeling ? Whatever name it bear, I 
glory in it ; and I know that God wrote it on my 
heart when he made me a child, when he made 
me a parent. It is an emotion that glowed in 
the bosom of Jesus ; for was it not his prayer, — 
" Father, I will that they whom thou hast given 
me be with me where I am " ? And is not the 
resurrection of the dead always presented in the 
New Testament in its social aspects? Those 
whom our Saviour restored to life were all given 
back to the bosom of their families. He raised 
the widow's son, and gave him to his mother. 



CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 179 

He took "the father and mother of the young 
maiden, and presented her to them alive. He 
called forth Lazarus to the embrace of his sisters. 
In thus doing, has he not pledged himself to do 
the like in the resurrection of the just ? Will he 
not, then, bring parted friends together, and re- 
store the long lost, vet unforgotten ? Li every 
family consecrated to his love, shall not the 
widow receive back her son, and the parent 
take his child to his embrace, and the sister 
her risen brother? 

I can hold no sympathy with that stern, gloomy 
mood of theological teaching which tells us that 
our affection for our kindred and friends ought 
to be here, and will be in heaven completely 
merged in our love for God and for man in 
general. Such is not the lesson which we might 
learn from our own growth in piety. Our domes- 
tic affections increase in intensity and purity with 
the growth of our love to God. No families are 
so closely and tenderly united by mutual affec- 
tion, as those where the spirit of heaven is shed 
abroad in every heart. A home where perfect 
love reigns is a laboratory of those kind and de- 
vout affections which go up to God, and range 
round the universe. Nor can we forget that he 
who dwelt iai the bosom of the Father, and shed 
his reconciling blood for the whole family of man, 
was a son, a brother, and a friend, — that he 
wept at the grave of Lazarus, — that he had a 



180 CONSOLING VIEWS OF DEATH. 

favorite disciple, — that his dying eyes sought 
out his mother. The soul has, indeed, an in- 
definite capacity of loving ; but it has not an 
infinite range of knowledge or power of ac- 
quaintance. In heaven we shall, no doubt, 
love every child of God ; but we cannot know 
all alike, or be equally intimate with all. From 
the very finiteness of our natures, we must have 
our peculiar associates and friends ; and who so 
likely to stand in that relation as those who were 
nurtured at the same family altar ? Doubt not, 
then, that in heaven we shall be united as we are 
now, — that as our love for God and for his uni- 
verse of being grows, so will those elective affini- 
ties which embrace individual friends grow in 
equal proportion, so that we of the same house- 
hold shall become more and more one family, our 
aims and pursuits, our tastes and aspirations, 
more and more intimately blended, so long as 
God shall exist. 



SERMON XIY. 



COME UP HITHER. 

THEY HEARD A GREAT VOICE FROM HEAVEN, SAYING UNTO 

THEM, COME UP HITHER. — Revelation xi. 12. 

I HAVE stood in a narrow valley, shut out by 
gigantic mountains from all the world beside. 
The grass and flowers were drenched with dew. 
The sun had not risen high enough to shine upon 
them. The cliffs, with bare, craggy brows and 
bald summits, frowned on either side, and the 
whole landscape was insufferably dreary and des- 
olate. I have stood on the peak of one of those 
cliffs, and thence, as far as the eye could reach, 
have seen only verdure, beauty, and grandeur, — 
the thin mist steaming up from winding rivulets, 
dew-drops sparkling, hill-tops beaming with crys- 
tal light, flakes of fleecy cloud flitting across the 
sky, and their blue shadows dancing up and 
down the mountain-sides, and all nature bathed 
in the Creator's blessing. And that little valley 
then smiled far beneath me, and looked like a 

16 



182 COME UP HITHER. 

very Eden. Thus do all earthly scenes depend 
upon the point of view from which they are be- 
held. The dwellers in the valley often get, for 
many days, no cheerful view. But to him who 
dwells aloft and looks down, all things are bright 
and good. We, for the most part, live below, 
where the mists are all around us, and the dew 
lies late upon our path. But a great voice from 
heaven has reached us, saying, — " Come up 
hither." Jesus invites us to lead with him a 
higher life in the bosom of the Father. He 
lifts us where we can look down upon the world, 
with all its strivings and its sorrows, and see it 
as it lies beneath the smile of divine love, its 
clouds spanned with the bow of peace, its tears 
the dew-drops of a happy morning. This is the 
Christian's point of view, for wliich he should 
aim and strive continually. Let us, my friends, 
now obey the call, — " Come up hither." Let us 
ascend the mount of clear vision. Let us view 
the elements of our earthly lot, as they would be 
viewed by an inhabitant of heaven. 

What, then, would be the aspect presented by 
our world to one who, from a lofty eminence, 
could take it in at a single glance ? It would 
seem to him an eminently happy world, full of 
bountiful provisions for the enjoyment of its liv- 
ing occupants. He would see every department 
of nature teeming with glad existences, — the air 
and the ocean deptlis, the pathless forests and 



COME UP HITHER. 183 

sunless caverns, all crowded with life and joy. 
Man would look happy, and seem highly favored. 
Rich harvest-fields, affluent homes, scenes of do- 
mestic love and social enjoyment, would fill the 
foreground of the picture. On a bright autumnal 
Sabbath like this, he would look far and wide, 
and see men everywhere resting in plenty from 
their harvest-tasks, and going up with their fami- 
lies in gladness (would to Heaven that it were in 
equal gratitude !) to the sanctuary of their God. 
No house would seem without its special bless- 
ings, — its joys wherewith the stranger meddleth 
not. Here and there, indeed, he would see some 
one in depression or suffering. But in many of 
these cases, he would find, on closer inspection, 
that habit had worn off the sting of chronic trou- 
bles, — that many a poor man was rich in the 
unbought blessings of health, peace, and love, — 
that many a sufferer owned, with a gratitude too 
full for utterance, the tenderest human sympathy, 
the light of a heaven-born faith, and the daily vis- 
itings of the Saviour's mercy. Only in the taber- 
nacles of sin would he behold traces of forlorn 
misery ; and even there he would see that God 
had not left himself without a witness, but that 
wayward man was striving with infinite love, 
darkening his own dwelling, piirposely shutting 
out the light of God's countenance, and, with 
fiendish art, over the fire of guilty passion dis- 
tilling curses from what God had ordained for 
good. 



184 COME UP HITHER. 

But the eye of our heavenly witness would dis- 
cern some homes of deep affliction. While there 
was light and gladness all around, over these 
dwellings would hang a thick and heavy cloud. 
But how would this cloud appear to him ? Big 
with inundating rains, or charged with the angry 
thunderbolt ? 0, no ! but freighted with fertiliz- 
ing showers, shed in due season, where the soil 
craved them, where the plants of God's husbandry 
needed them, — shed, perhaps, at the very mo- 
ment when the sun had risen with a withering 
heat, and the germs of virtue and piety were 
ready to perish. Griefs from the hand of Provi- 
dence would seem to him to drop as the rain, and 
distil as the dew ; and often would he see them 
changing the wilderness into a garden, and bring- 
ing up, " instead of the thorn, the fir-tree, and 
instead of the brier, the myrtle." Often, too, 
where faith and patience had been severely dis- 
ciplined, and the field seemed to human eye white 
for the harvest, he would see one more shower 
needed before the reaper put in his sickle, and 
bound his choice, ripe sheaves. As he beheld 
worldliness and selfishness purged away, and the 
soil of man's flinty heart thus softened and fertil- 
ized by sorrow, his eye would rest with a solemn 
gladness on the house of affliction, as best show- 
ing forth the Father's love, and he would say with 
Jesus, — " Blessed are they that mourn." 

But he who thus took his point of view from 



COME UP HITHER. 185 

heaven would see not earthly things alone. He 
would be surrounded by celestial beings and ob- 
jects, — would be let into the counsels of the 
Almighty, — would discern the harmonies be- 
tween heaven and earth, the dispositions with 
which man was regarded from above, the treas- 
ures laid up, the joys reserved, for him at the 
right hand of God. And what would he see ? 
Weak, short-lived man constantly recognized in 
the great plan of universal Providence, — love, 
tender care, minute watchfulness over every hu- 
man soul, on the part of Him who balances the 
sun and speeds the stars on their circuit. He 
would see nature, in all her vastness and beauty, 
but the means, man the end, — nature but the 
nurse of his infancy, her laws ordained, her har- 
monies attuned, for his happiness and progress. 
He would see all the happy spirits about the 
throne looking upon man with brotherly interest 
and sympathy, ready to move on errands of love 
for him, rejoicing in every prodigal's return, wel- 
coming to the shores of eternity every new pil- 
grim. But over what scenes of earth would he 
discern most joy in heaven ? Would it be over 
scenes of gladness, where the song and the laugh 
rang merrily, over unbroken families, over man- 
sions of luxury, over the bright eye, the buoyant 
step, the full soul ? No. He would see angel 
visitants most frequent and most happy in scenes 
of sorrow, where the stricken spirit was learning 

16* 



186 COME UP HITHER. 

to submit, and trust, and love, — where the plants 
of heavenly grace, deep-rooted in well-watered 
furrows, were springing up into everlasting life. 
And as soul after soul passed through this ordeal 
with firmer faith and warmer piety, they of heav- 
en would mark such spirits as of their own line- 
age and kindred, saying, — " These are they that 
have come out of great tribulation, and have 
washed their robes, and made them white in 
the blood of the Lamb." 

He who thus stood in the assembly above would 
see around him many earth-born angels, trans- 
lated from desolate homes below to their Father's 
house. He would behold the lost and wept of 
human families enthroned in unfading glory. He 
would marvel at the grief of those left behind ; 
for how, he would ask, can they that love their 
friends lament so hopelessly their entrance upon 
unspeakable joy ? Nor would he appreciate that 
sundering of the bonds of kindred and intimacy, 
which we so keenly feel ; for he would see that 
the ransomed spirit forgot not the house of clay 
and the companions of its pilgrimage. He would 
see the love of kindred and friends only made 
purer and stronger by the touch of death, and the 
redeemed above still bound by indissoluble ties 
as one family with those below. He would hear 
from the translated infant warm intercessions for 
sorrowing parents, — from the ransomed mother 
tlie prayer of an unsl umbering love, that her or- 



COME UP HITHER. 187 

plian little ones might be kept from the snares of 
sin, and safely and purely led liome to her em- 
brace. He would behold the dead the guardian 
angels of the living, deeming it more than heaven 
to be charged Avith ministries of mercy to the 
family below, — to inspire sweet dreams, happy 
thoughts, and sustaining hopes. He would see 
every pious house overshadowed by the seraph 
wings of those who had been trained for glory 
within its walls. To his eye, death would be 
swallowed up in life, the walls of sense would 
disappear, and heaven and earth would seem the 
universal house of God, in which all that dwelt 
in him dwelt also in one another. 

Thus, no doubt, does it seem to those of our 
innocent and pious kindred that have gone before 
us. Such are the views which they take from 
the walls of the new Jerusalem. Nor need we 
wait for death, in order to take these views. 
Jesus, through the parted heavens, says to us, 
— " Come up hither." My afflicted friends, he 
bids you look up from your darkened homes to 
the house not made with hands. You have, in- 
deed, consigned the outward forms, which were 
tlie delight of your eyes, to a sleep from which 
there is no awaking. But that which knew, and 
loved, and hoped, is with God, not a bright trait 
of character dimmed, not a pure desire ungrati- 
fied, not a bud of promise blighted, no change 
passing over them but that from stage to stage 
of progress and joy. 



188 COME UP HITHER. 

Some of you mourn those taken away in infan- 
cy, ere the blight of sin or grief had fallen upon 
their young spirits. Such as they are near the 
Good Shepherd's heart. Yield them up to him, 
my friends, as trustingly as if he were on earth, 
and asked you for them, and proffered them his 
teaching and his guidance. How gladly would 
you welcome him, were he here, into your fam- 
ilies, and carry forth your little ones as he passed 
by the way, tliat his shadow might rest upon 
them, and that his words of love, once heard and 
unforgotten, might sink deep into their hearts ! 
Were he gathering, as once in Galilee, his little 
company of faithful followers, and did he enter 
your homes, and say of those that cluster around 
your family altars, — " Suffer them to come un- 
to me," — could you keep them back? Would 
you not thankfully surrender them to his care, 
and let him guide and bless them in his own way, 
and in his own unceasing presence ? He has 
done yet more for those who have been gathered 
into his heavenly flock. He has taught them to 
bear part in the anthem of the redeemed. He 
has filled their minds with truth and their hearts 
with love. He has led them in the spotless robe 
of infancy to the God that gave them, and they 
are without fault before his throne. If you lovo 
them, will you not rejoice for them ? Would you 
crave them back, yet more to suffer and again to 
(iie, — perhaps still worse, to be living and yet 



COME UP HITHER. 189 

dead, to stumble into the pitfalls of sin, and at 
length to carry to the judgment-seat, marred and 
blackened, those spirits which they have now ren- 
dered back pure as they came into being ? 

My Christian friends, it is not only to those 
that wear the weeds of recent sorrow that it has 
been said, — " Come up hither." The invitation 
comes to us equally in our brightest and happiest 
days. As disciples of Christ, our true dwelling- 
place is with him before the throne. It is only 
as our life is hid with Christ in God, that we 
spiritually live. If we are truly his, our heaven 
will be literally begun here, — not, indeed, the 
heaven of outward circumstance, but the heaven 
of the soul, that of unruffled peace, joy in God, 
calm submission, and implicit trust. We shall 
walk by faith, and not by sight. We shall dwell 
in God, the centre of all harmonies ; and then 
the course of earthly events will not seem to us 
irregular and fragmentary, but we shall trace 
through all its hidings and its windings the plan 
of infinite mercy, — nature and Providence, joy 
and sorrow, life and death, all will be to us " the 
varied God." Storms may, indeed, come ; but 
we shall be above them, and, as from the pavil- 
ion of the Most High, we shall sec the lightnings 
flash and hear the thunders roll beneath us. 

Brethren, we need this heavenly frame of mind, 
this lofty point of view, not only with reference 
to the severer trials of life, but no less for our 



190 COME UP HITHER. 

daily conflicts with the hist of power, gain, or 
pleasure, with petty temptations, witli easily be- 
setting sins. We need, above the mists of earth, 
above the false beacon-fires of policy or selfish- 
ness, a position from which we can survey the 
path of life with a calm, unbiased eye. We need 
a stand-point from which we can view duty as 
God views it, and as we shall be content to have 
viewed it when life's last sands are running. 
Satan perpetually plants himself in our way with 
an angel's stolen garment ; and nothing can de- 
liver us from his wiles but our diligent heed to 
the great voice from heaven, saying to us, — 
" Come up hither." This voice, if we hear it in 
our days of joy, will reach us in sorrow and be- 
reavement ; and God will call us up into the ark 
prepared for his chosen ones, Avhen the storm is 
abroad, and the floods lift up their voice. 

While here, we must, indeed, lead a divided 
life, bearing the image both of the earthly and 
the heavenly. The spirit will sometimes be will- 
ing, but the flesh weak. Sight will sometimes 
get the better of faith, and we shall then remain 
in the valley, instead of climbing the mount of 
God. At times our horizon will seem all shut in. 
Mysteries, deep and unfathomable, will hang over 
the course of Providence. Our way will lie 
through gathering clouds. But in death will the 
great voice from heaven say to us, once and for 
ever, — " Come up hither " ; and with angels and 



COME UP HITHER. 191 

ransomed men, with patriarchs, prophets, and 
apostles, with our sainted parents, our bosom 
friends, and the lambs without spot or blemish, 
translated from our flocks to the service of the 
heavenly altar, we shall stand on the sea of glass, 
having the harps of God, and chanting the praises 
of Him who hath abolished death, and brought 
life and immortality to light. 



SERMON XY. 



THE VANITY OF LIFE. 

THEN I LOOKED ON ALL THE WORKS THAT MT HANDS HAD 
WROUGHT, AND ON THE LABOR THAT I HAD LABORED TO 
DO ; AND, BEHOLD, ALL WAS VANITY AND VEXATION OP 
SPIRIT, AND THERE WAS NO PROFIT UNDER THE SUN. — 

Ecclesiastes ii. 11. 

I KNOW of no more genuine record of human 
experience than the book of Ecclesiastes affords. 
It is testimony wrung from the heart of one who 
had tried the whole round of earthly pursuits 
and pleasures, who had fathomed the resources of 
knowledge and fame, wealth and power, the feast 
and the dance, laughter and mirth, lust and wine, 
and who sums up the whole as mere vanity and 
vexation of spirit. Tlie author professes to have 
reached the decline of a life of pre-eminent lus- 
tre, luxury, and prosperity ; and yet there was in 
the retrospect nothing on which his eye could re- 
pose with satisfaction, — nothing that had filled 
his soul, or left a fragrance behind. He pro- 
nounces the dead far happier than the living, and 
those who died before they had tasted the cup of 



THE VANITY OF LIFE. 193 

life the happiest of all ; and yet to him death 
is an endless sleep, the dust mingling with kin- 
dred dust, the soul reabsorbed into the divine 
essence from which it came. Far be it from me, 
though I now come to you in sadness, to present 
such dark views of life. In such views no Chris- 
tian can rest. To every believing heart Jesus 
repeats the primeval blessing of the Almighty 
on the works of his hands ; and still, as in the 
morning of creation, all things are very good. 
Yet the view of life which our text suggests 
must have distinctly presented itself to every 
one who has borne the burdens and bowed un- 
der the sorrows of mortality ; and it is the only 
view which remains possible for one destitute 
of Christian faith, — it represents the true state 
of things with one who is living without God 
and without hope in the world. In order for 
the worldly and self-indulgent to arrive at this 
view, it is only needful for them to pause and 
reflect. And I would that they oftener reached 
it ; for if they did, they would not rest till they 
had come to Jesus, and learned of him. Let us 
now consider the vanity of the present state of 
being, considered as our only state. 

Suppose, in the first place, that a decree were 
to go forth, perpetuating your present condition, 
— pronouncing that you should remani eternally 
just as you are now. How would you receive 
such a decree ? There are, indeed, many of you 

17 



194 THE VANITY OF LIFE. 

who seem happy, prosperous, rich, surrounded 
by favorable circumstances. But is there one of 
you who would be wiUing to stop the wheel of 
fortune now and for ever ? Should this take 
place, everything would seem to you dark, nar- 
row, insufficient, and unpropitious. Where is 
the man who has climbed as high, or won as 
much, or established himself as firmly, as he 
means and desires ? Where is the soul that has 
not still in embryo some darling plan which it 
would be misery to drop ? Where is the fam- 
ily which lives not to a greater or less degree 
broken by the absence or death of its members, 
and which depends not for much of its comfort 
and joy on the return of the long absent, or re- 
union with the holy dead ? Who would be will- 
ing that the divided family should remain so for 
ever ? If you will look into your own hearts, 
my friends, you will find that you are living 
more in the future than in the present, moro 
in your plans than in your possessions, — that 
you depend more on what you think that you are 
laying up for time to come, than on any means 
of enjoyment actually in hand. What, then, 
have you attained as to this world ? Flowers 
without fruit, golden promises, flattering hopes, a 
rich expectancy of happiness ; but could you see 
nothing beyond the passing moment, you would 
at once pronounce all to be vanity and vexation 
of spirit, and would exclaim in bitterness, — 



THE VANITY OF LIFE. 195 

" What have I of all the works that my hands 
have wrought, and of all the labor that I have 
labored to do ? '* 

But what will this future on which you are 
building bring to you ? Incompleteness, vexa- 
tion, disappointment, bereavement, sorrow. Few 
of your blossoms will ripen into fruit ; few of 
your plans will be realized ; very little of what 
you now clearly sec in the future will shape itself 
as you see it. Many of the visions that now be- 
guile you will pass away as a dream. Never will 
come the time upon earth when you will say, — 
"I have attained, — I am ready to enjoy, — now 
let the wheel stop rolling, and I will be content." 
The farther you go on in life, the more blighted 
hopes will lie behind you, the more vacant places 
will there be in the circle of your kindred and 
friendship, the more will there be in your outward 
condition to make you feel that there is no rest 
or home for you on this side of the grave. But 
you will still toil and strive on, till age creeps 
upon you ; and then you may, perhaps, seat your- 
self down to the calm enjoyment of the fruits of 
your labors. But if you then look within and 
around you, what will you find your condition to 
be ? You will see the instrument/ of enjoyment 
fled, when its means are at length attained. 
Your perceptions will be languid, your elastici- 
ty of spirit gone, your taste for every form and 
object of luxury paralyzed. Those with whom 



196 THE VANITY OF LIFE. 

you had hoped to walk in the quiet of Hfe's even- 
ing will have departed hence, no more to be seen 
on earth. The children whom you had thought to 
see clustering like tendrils, fresh and green, about 
the aged vine, will be either scattered abroad in 
the world, surrounded with cares and hopes of 
their own, or numbered among the early dead. 
And in looking back from tlie close of the most 
prosperous life, you will find that your whole 
course might be likened to the drawing of water 
in a vessel full of holes and pouring it into a 
broken cistern, — that, of the results of all your 
labor and sore travail upon earth, you will have 
lost most by the way, and kept none to the end. 

Again, if you would look into your hearts, in 
the gayest and most gladsome moments of earthly 
enjoyment, you will perceive much of this same 
emptiness and vanity. Who has not at such 
times been conscious, as it were, of a double 
self, of an uneasiness in the midst of gratifica- 
tion, of a restless feeling in the very fulness of 
seeming joy, of a voice that whispers, " Up and 
be doing," while many voices bid us stay, and 
drown all other thoughts in the scene before us ? 
When, except in early youth, have we found the 
time when we could throw ourselves wholly into 
any such scene, and say with an undivided heart, 
— " It is good for us to be here " ? It seems to 
me that there is no season when melancholy is 
more apt to steal over us, and the feeling that 



THE VANITY OF LIFE. 197 

all is vanity to rise up within us, than when gay 
voices are around us, and the insignia of mirth 
arc spread before us. The mind cannot help 
turning to that reverse of the picture, so near 
to some, so sure to all, when sorrow will darken 
the happy dwelling, — when that head so full of 
glad thoughts will toss upon the fevered couch, 
— when that heart tln'obbing so quick with 
young hopes will beat slow and sad its passage, 
to the grave, — when, instead of the song and 
the dance, will be the coffin and the dirge. 

But though at these seasons such thoughts will 
come over us, we crowd them out. There are, 
however, times when they are forced upon us, 
and we cannot expel them. There are times of 
sudden and overwhelming grief, when calamity 
breaks in upon us like a swift flood, and seems to 
wash away the very ground on which we stand. 
As, amazed and dizzy, we witness the withering 
in an hour of that on which we had reposed the 
trust of many years, as we bend over the lifeless 
forms of one after another of those with whom 
every fibre of our own being was bound up, we 
feel that there is nothing permanent or trust- 
worthy here, — that at our best estate we are al- 
together vanity, — that earth's fairest mansions 
are but wliited sepulchres, her choicest fruit but 
dust and ashes. We are then conscious of the 
frailty of what remains to us, no less than of 
what has been taken from us, and can say from 

17* 



198 THE VANITY OF LIFE. 

the heart, that there is nothing here below on 
which we can place the least dependence, — 
nothing which we dare to love as we have 
loved, or to trust as we have trusted. Then, 
were it not for the words of eternal life, we 
could say in intense anguish, — " All is vanity 
and vexation of spirit, and there is no profit 
under the sun." 

But after all, though we walk in a vain show, 
there is enjoyment in life, — in our mere earthly 
life. Yet from what does it flow ? Not from the 
ever-changing scene, not from the winter-frozen 
and summer-dried fountains around us, but from 
the unchanging love of God, the bow of whose 
promise remains fixed over the stream of time 
and the waves of unceasing vicissitude. Not by 
these time-shadows, but by their eternal sub- 
stance, by the immutable I am, are we blessed ; 
and the bright gleams from the current of earthly 
events, that make us glad, are but the reflection 
of his smile. He who gives the ravens their food 
feeds also his human children, and by filling all 
things with his love makes us happy. "We ask 
why we are glad. We analyze life and its re- 
sources, and can find no reason for our happi- 
ness. All seems so unsubstantial and evanes- 
cent, we wonder that we should ever have felt 
an emotion of joy ; and all the while, it may 
be, we forget to look to Him who alone has 
made us happy, — whose ever-flowing love has 



THE VANITY OF LIFE. 199 

imparted a continuity to change, has breathed 
life into a world of death, has made things in 
themselves vain — yea, and things which are 
not — the sources of enduring good. But if 
tliis be so, then is God our chief good and our 
highest joy, and in proportion as we approach 
him do we quit the vain for the real, the shadow 
for the substance. 

And, blessed be God, there is that in life which 
is not vanity or vexation. Though favor be de- 
ceitful and beauty vain, though the grass wither 
and the flower fade, the word of God abideth 
for ever, — even that word which in Jesus was 
made flesh, and which is anew incarnate in every 
regenerate heart. The outer man may perish, 
the desire of the eyes and the pride of life may 
fail ; but the signature of God's spirit on the in- 
ner man time cannot efface, or the waves of death 
wash away. The soul, character, virtue, piety, 
remain, amidst the reverses of fortune, the deso- 
lation of our households, the wasting of disease, 
and the thunder-blast of death. And if on the 
theatre of life the soul may clothe herself in gar- 
ments of righteousness that shall never wax old, 
then is life precious and holy and full of dignity ; 
and if, from the wreck of all things earthly, the 
soul may gather the trophies of a purer faith and 
a more fervent love, then may we bid a welcome, 
— solemn and tearful though it be, — a welcome 
to the storms and billows of adversity, believing 



200 THE VANITY OF LIFE. 

that they can work only for our progress and our 

highest good. 

There have, I trust, my friends, been seasons 
of your lives, when, had you analyzed what made 
you blessed, you would have found it not vanity, 
but a holy and eternal reality. You have, it may 
be, at some time encountered strong temptation. 
Sin was near. Opportunity favored. The tempt- 
er whispered, — "Thou slialt not surely die." 
Passion or appetite earnestly craved the guilty 
compHance, and you felt your faith wavering. 
But you summoned God to your help. You arose 
in the majesty of inward might, and said, — 
" Tempter, depart ; Father, I am tliine." You 
came off conqueror, and beheld Satan, like light- 
ning, falling from the heavens. This victory has 
not ceased to make you happy. There was no de- 
lusion in the joy of such an hour. It will bear 
the closest scrutiny. It was a joy which earth 
could not have given, aiid which time cannot take 
away. You feel that your soul grew in this con- 
flict, — that you took a new onward step in your 
eternal career, — that you gained treasure that 
will endure while God lives. 

You have gone forth, it may be, at some time, 
on an errand of love, alone, without sympathy, 
without sounding a trumpet before you, in the 
spirit of true Christian benevolence. You were 
made a blessing to some desolate and forsaken 
one. Your compassion dropped as the dew of 



THE VANITY OF LIFK. 201 

heayeu upon some withered spirit. You were 
eyes to tlie blind, or as a father to the poor. You 
were made the minister of hope to the despair- 
ing or of life to the spiritually dead. Years may 
have rolled by, and there perhaps remains not an 
earthly sign of the good that you wrought ; and 
yet you feel that it has not passed away, — that 
it could not perish, — that, though no longer seen, 
it is eternal. That outgoing of the soul towards 
a fellow-being, that lengthening of the chain of 
sympatliy, that development of godlike love, is a 
good which time cannot take from you, or im- 
mortality exhaust. 

Again, you have been in deep affliction. It was 
at the tenderest point that the arrow of a mys- 
terious Providence pierced your soul. It was 
where you most hoped and expected to be spared, 
that God's hand was heaviest upon you. Yet you 
had faith to look up through the clouds and dark- 
ness, and to say in full sincerity, — " Father, thy 
will be done ! " You brought the sacrifice to the 
altar, with a consenting, though bursting heart, 
saying, — " Lord, here thou hast that is thine. '* 
That act of faith has not passed away. It remains 
tlie indestructible property of your soul. You 
believed in God, and he counted it for righteous- 
ness. It stands recorded in his book of eternal 
remembrance, — it stands indelibly engraven on 
the tablets of your own heart. The sorrow can 
endure but for a season, perhaps has already given 



202 THE VANITY OF LIFE. 

place to brighter skies ; but the trust in God, 
which, when your soul was dark, filled it with 
submission and praise, is still the strength of your 
heart, and will be your portion for ever. 

None of the soul's religious exercises are lost. 
Your penitence, your seeking after God, your 
prayers of faith, your labors of love, you cannot 
look upon as vanity. In contemplating duty 
wrought, temptation resisted, sin subdued, you 
feel no vexation of spirit. In looking at the re- 
sults of your religious culture, you have no dis- 
position to say, — " There is no profit under the 
sun." 

These thoughts open to us the true value of 
life, and show us wherein the author of our text 
looked upon it from a false point of view. He 
thought of it as a final home, — as an end, not a 
means, — as the sum, not the cradle, of man's 
being. He deemed the supreme purpose of ex- 
istence to be the attainment of the highest point 
of worldly joy and greatness, and no wonder that 
he found all to be vanity and vexation of spirit ; 
for he sought fulh satisfaction for the immortal in 
the perishing, for the unseen spirit in things seen. 
We, as Christians, regard the present state less as 
life than as a passage from death to life. We take 
the good things of earth as types and pledges of 
unseen and satisfying joys, as the revelation of 
God and the earnest of heaven. We look to 
earthly pleasures, not as the end of our being, but 



THE VANITY OF LIFE. 203 

as refreshments on our pilgrim way. We receive 
and enjoy them with gratitude, yet dare not trust 
them, or set our hearts upon them. We see the 
sentence of change and death written upon them, 
nor would we have it otherwise ; for we ourselves 
desire to be changed, and we would have changes 
going on around us, to keep us on the alert, and 
to have our spirits disenthralled when our own 
change shall come. 

But wliile there is nothing in these views to 
embitter life, how much is there in them to make 
us look forward to death with composure and 
cheerfulness ! We speak, indeed, of being at- 
tached to the world, of clinging to life ; but this 
is entirely indefinite language. The world about 
us, the complexion of life, is continually changing. 
Those aspects of nature which most charm us pass 
away almost as soon as they appear. In our 
earthly lot, how often does the day give no token 
of what shall be on the morrow ! — how seldom 
do the elements of our domestic and social life 
remain unchanged from year to year ! New faces 
surround us, new intimacies encircle us, new ca- 
reers of effort call us away from the old. Our 
parents are gathered to their fathers. Our chil- 
dren follow them. Our earthly house is dissolved. 
There is silence where there were glad voices, — 
desolation, where there was thrilling joy. Our 
life becomes a bundle of broken fibres, — our 
condition on earth constantly grows more iiidefi- 



204 THE VANITY OF LIFE. 

nite and fragmentary. Still we adhere to this 
idea of life, as if it were something fixed and 
tangible. The truth is (and it is a truth that 
should call forth an unceasing flow of gratitude) , 
that one and the same God lives in all this change, 
and through a vast diversity of operations con- 
ducts the same work of love, so that what is defi- 
nite and permanent is not life, but the God of 
our lives. These constantly varying forms, in 
which God blesses us, are but so many ways in 
which he seeks to make himself known to us, and 
solicits our trust and love. It is not, then, to life, 
but to God, that we should cling, and thus seek 
the true life, which waits for its consummation, 
till the corruptible shall clothe itself in incorrup- 
tion, and the mortal shall put on immortality. 



SERMON XYI. 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

THOUGH I UNDERSTAND ALL MYSTERIES, AND ALL KNOWI- 
EDGE, AND HAVE NOT CHARITY, I AM NOTHING. 1 Corill' 

thians xiii. 2. 

In choosing this passage for a text, I can hardly 
need tell you that charity here denotes not mere 
almsgiving or mere kindness of heart, but that 
expansive, comprehensive love which embraces 
God and every child of God. 

Ours is an age of great intellectual activity. 
Mental attainments, skill, power, and achieve- 
ments were never estimated so highly as now. 
In former times, and under different degrees of 
culture, first, mere physical strength, then, the 
mere accident of birth or hereditary rank, then, 
and almost till now, wealth, have successively 
been the measures of greatness, and the prime 
objects of ambition, desire, and envy. But now 
the aristocracy of the world is an aristocracy of 
intellect. The gifts of mind are everywhere 

18 



206 THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

deemed the best gifts. Every one wishes to be 
known as a person of large, or sound, or well- 
furnished intellect, and the reproach of ignorance 
or folly is dreaded as the deepest possible stigma. 
Now this state of things is to be rejoiced in as 
beyond measure better than that in which mere 
external advantages were the supreme objects of 
esteem and desire. We are right in looking down, 
as from a superior point of view, upon times when 
strength, or rank, or wealth, was worshipped for 
its own sake. But there is danger, that, while 
we look down, we fail to look up, — that, while 
we rejoice in having found something better than 
men used to seek and strive for, we may not rec- 
ognize that which alone is supremely good. Re- 
ligion is the life of the affections ; and, in the 
reverence now paid to intellect, there is danger 
that religion be undervalued, and that the affec- 
tions, which are its throne, receive much less than 
their due regard and cultivation. I fear that re- 
ligious institutions and observances are looked 
upon with a great degree of superciliousness and 
indifference by many who think that they arc 
seeking the best gifts. I apprehend that many 
young people, now pressing forward into life, re- 
gard it as the sole aim and end of being to obtain 
intellectual character, reputation, and influence, 
to be wise and prudent, and to leave the impress 
of their own minds, according to their measure, 
on the few or the many, on their community, 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 207 

their country, or their race. I see many youth 
of promise, just entering upon active life, who 
cherish generous and lofty sentiments, are raised 
above all mean or degrading tastes, and intend 
to act their part well and nobly, who yet evi- 
dently do not take a religious character and in- 
fluence into their plan of life, or look forward 
to a place in the Church of Christ as an essential 
post of duty, or anticipate the blessing of the 
fatherless and the widow among their crowns of 
rejoicing. My present object is to set before you 
the religious life, the life of the affections, the 
life of God in the soul and of the soul in God, 
as the highest and most desirable style of char- 
acter. 

Permit me, at the outset, to define the religious 
life. I mean by it a life, not of mere decencies 
and proprieties, but of warm and active love. It 
includes, first, the habitual and thankfid recog- 
nition of a present God and a watchful Provi- 
dence, and the exercise of the religious affections 
in prayer, praise, and grateful obedience, — then 
and thence, the cherishing of sincere brotherly 
love towards our fellow-men, the cultivation of 
meekness, gentleness, and kindness towards all, 
and a cordial interest in every cause of human 
progress and well-being. In fine, the religious 
life implies a heart wliicli constantly breathes for 
itself and for all men the prayer, — "Thy king- 
dom come." And it is this whicli I would now 



208 THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

set forth as of incomparably greater worth than 
a merely intellectnal life, and as alone giving the 
patent of true nobility to a mind, however large, 
active, and powerful. 

I first remark, that the life of the affections is 
essential to the full development and healthy 
working of the intellect. The affections are onr 
highest faculties. They have the nearest view of 
truth, and the strongest hold upon it, often by 
direct intuition apprehending portions of it, to 
which reason and judgment must work a weary 
way of analysis and proof. Of the men who have 
enlarged the bounds of human knowledge, and 
have essentially connected their names with the 
progress of the race, there has been hardly one 
whose mind was not trained by religious faith 
and reverence. By this you will not under- 
stand me as saying that no great men have been 
unbelievers or irreligious. Far from it. There 
have been many men void of religious belief and 
principle, who have been brilliant, profound, 
learned, eloquent, — who have left great names 
and a luminous track where they disappeared. 
But what I mean to say is this. Prepare as 
complete a list as y^^u can of the various depart- 
ments of human knowledge, — take up those de- 
partments one by one, and call over in eacli the 
creative minds, ^ those that have given to each 
its existence and its laws, — those wliose labors 
were you to expunge from their respective do- 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 209 

partments, you must tear out large and solid por- 
tions from the learning and science of a race, — 
you will find that the men on this catalogue have, 
with hardly an exception, had their minds nur- 
tured and strengthened by the religious affections, 
— that they have revered and worshipped God, 
have felt and owned the power of Christian truth, 
and have often been warm, generous, and devot- 
ed philanthropists. - Diligent study of the history 
of science for the purpose of testing this view has 
given me a conviction which has no room to grow 
stronger, that there exists an essential connection 
of cause and effect between the life of the heart 
and that of the mind, and that the highest walks 
of intellectual greatness cannot be reached with- 
out the keenness, breadth, and loftiness of vision, 
and the great fundamental ideas and principles, 
which religious belief and consciousness alone 
can supply. 

You and I, indeed, may not aspire to the first 
rank of intellectual eminence. But if we desire 
to fill respectably and usefully an humbler place, 
it is well that we know how great minds have 
become great ; for by the same instrumentality 
smaller minds may be enlarged and elevated. 
And, in truth, there are many minds that need 
moral culture alone in order to make themselves 
extensively felt and highly respected. There are 
many men who exert no intellectual influence, 
simply because they have no moral power. They 

18* 



210 THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

are keen, shrewd, well-informed, of sound discre- 
tion, of admirable executive capacity ; and yet 
you cannot render tliem the confidence or defer- 
ence that they seem to claim, simply because their 
views are all sordid, narrow, and selfish. They 
are never stirred by fresh and generous impulses. 
There always hangs about them a sceptical, dis- 
trustful atmosphere, which makes their presence 
like a very iceberg to the hopeful, earnest, and 
sanguine. But give them faith in God and man, 
— thaw out the ice around their hearts, — once 
start in their souls the flow of devout and chari- 
table feeling, and their minds would grow apace, 
would acquire new depth and largeness of view 
on every class of subjects, and would be felt and 
owned as leading and controlling minds in their 
respective circles. Their influence, too, would in 
that case be worthy of being confided and re- 
joiced in ; for they would then recognize in all 
their reasonings and decisions those foundation- 
truths in the moral universe which they now 
ignore, but which, from the very necessity of the 
case, must lie at the basis of all practical wisdom. 
I would next compare the life of the aflections 
and that of the intellect as to the promise of suc- 
cess and attainment. In every path of intellect- 
ual effort, the saying of the Apostle with regard 
to the ancient games, — "All run, but only one 
receives the prize," — is almost literally applica- 
ble. The prizes are but for few. What many 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 211 

seek, here and there one can win ; and for every 
grade of intellectual rank and influence, many 
aspirants fail where few succeed. But the high 
places of moral excellence are within the reach 
of all. In our Father's house are many man- 
sions, and an equal welcome for all who strive 
to enter. 

Then, too, how much nearer absolute perfec- 
tion can we approach in the moral than in the 
intellectual life ! Our growth in knowledge is 
growth in conscious ignorance. The dimensions 
of truth enlarge before us faster than our concep- 
tions of it. Perfect knowledge and perfect wis- 
dom are unknown terms this side of heaven. But 
of the life of the affections, of that love which 
mounts in prayer to the throne of God, and ex- 
cludes none of his children from its embrace, 
the Divine Teacher has said, — " Be ye perfect, 
even as your Father in heaven is perfect." In 
piety and charity we may measure our spirits 
with that of the perfect Redeemer, — may look 
with despair on no trait of his character, — may 
make absolute perfection our constant aim, our 
ever nearer goal. These thoughts are strikingly 
illustrated in the history of our race. The wisest 
men have always been outgrown in a few genera- 
tions, and the ignorance of men who filled the 
world with their renown is the laughing-stock of 
modern schoolboys. We look down on all an- 
cient wisdom as men used to look up to it ; and 



212 THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

future generations of children will learn in their 
infant schools truths that have but just dawned 
upon the greatest minds of the present day. But 
a good man the world never outgrows, never 
looks down upon. Elijah and Daniel, Stephen 
and Paul, fill as large and high a place in the 
world's eye as if they had lived in the last cen- 
tury. Fenelon and Oberlin will seem to the end 
of time to have reached as lofty a summit of per- 
fection as that on which they stand to our view. 
The stars in the galaxy of moral excellence never 
grow dim, and can never be outshone. And these 
stars shoot up into the firmament from the low- 
liest homes and the humblest walks of duty ; for 
no obscurity of earthly place can cut off one who 
lives in love, and labors for man in the strength of 
God, from the early recorded blessing, — " They 
that turn many to righteousness shall shine as 
stars for ever and ever." 

We might again compare the life of mere in- 
tellect with that of the affections, as to the power 
of resisting severe temptation and blighting evil. 
It is a common idea among the young and san- 
guine, that a clear mind, sound sense, and an ac- 
curate perception of the qualities and tendencies 
of actions, are enough to save one from moral 
degradation and ruin. Many strong-minded and 
well-disposed young people deem it impossible 
that they should ever blacken their characters 
by vice, they have such very just and clear 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 213 

views of the path of life, and arc so well aware 
of all its snares and pitfalls. But none can esti- 
mate in advance the subtleness of moral evil, or 
the over-mastering power of passion. Opportu- 
nity may urge, desire may wax strong, outward 
safeguards may be removed, and corrupt exam- 
ple may be witnessed on every side ; and the 
merely intellectual life has no element that can 
allay desire, subdue appetite, or stem the current 
of custom or example. I have known men, sec- 
ond to none of our day in mental power and cul- 
ture, but sceptical as to religious truth, ensnared 
in palpable and gross meanness, arrested in an 
honorable career by a shameful exposure, and 
condemned ever after to toil wearily up the as- 
cent on which they were rapidly climbing, with 
the burden of a suspicious character and a dam- 
aged reputation. I have known, and so have 
you, others absolutely cut down, on the career 
opening before them with peculiar promise, by 
those vices which, once indulged in, leave not 
the victim the freedom of which he previously 
made his boast. Many such, of the highest men- 
tal endowments, sleep in early graves, dug by 
their own profligacy. Many more still cumber 
the earth, of which they were the destined orna- 
ments. But the affections, fixed on a present 
God, and filling the life with words and deeds 
of charity and mercy, have power over every 
meaner element and propensity of our nature. 



214 THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

The soul that prays has ever at hand a name in 
which it can bid the tempter depart. The soul 
that owns the all-seeing Father, and lives con- 
sciously in his presence, draws ever new strength 
from its heavenly communings, and cherishes el- 
ements of thought and feeling with which guilty 
reveries, plans, and purposes cannot co-exist. 
God's omnipotent spirit dwelling in the soul of 
man, and that alone, can say to appetite, — " Thus 
far shalt thou go, and no farther" ; and to pas- 
sion, — " Peace, be still." 

There is another view, which strikingly illus- 
trates the superiority of the life of the affections. 
To take it, we must follow life to those latter days, 
which a part only reach, but to which all look for- 
ward, and for which all make provision. The 
life of intellectual vigor, reputation, and influence 
has its meridian, and then its decline. High 
moral culture and attainments alone modify the 
operation of this law, and that not invariably. 
Beyond a certain point, one must expect to see 
more recent wisdom preferred to his own, and to 
yield place to younger aspirants for the rewards 
which mere acumen and activity of mind can com- 
mand. And he who is thus set aside or thrown 
back, to make room for those of a succeeding 
generation, if possessed of no moral resources, 
grows almost uniformly unhappy and misan- 
thropic. You can think of those whose early ca- 
reer was brilliant and eminent, but of whom tlie 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 215 

world has evidently made all the use that it ever 
will make, and has left them, with the conscious- 
ness of being thrown aside, to expiate the moral 
and religious unthrift of earlier years by a vacant, 
weary, and wretched old age. Not so with him 
who has lived in piety and love. Moral qualities 
fade not with declining years, wither not with the 
frosts of age. The plants of our Heavenly Fa- 
ther's planting are all evergreens. Nor yet is the 
good man, in his old age, readily thrust aside, or 
willingly spared from his post of duty. Vener- 
ation and love for him only grow the more in- 
tense and tender, as his steps tremble on the mar- 
gin of eternity. We never feel ready to miss him 
from the scenes hallowed by his devotion diid en- 
riched by his charity. Blessings follow him to 
his home, when he can leave it no more ; and the 
grateful intercessions of those who honored him in 
life waft his dying spirit to the presence of his 
Father and his Saviour, while he, to his last mo- 
ment, so far from feeling that his work is done, 
deems it but just begun when he emerges from the 
contracted routine of earthly duty into the larger, 
loftier sphere of activity offered him in heaven. 
But look around you, in low places and in high, 
and say if there be an old age that you would 
willingly make your own, among those whose 
youth and prime were unconsecrated by the cov- 
enarit of God, and unblessed by the joys of relig- 
ious faith and trust. Yet can you not find in 



216 THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

every walk of life aged Christians, in whose places 
yon would gladly stand, and for the peace and 
joy of whose declining years you would earnestly 
pray, should God spare you long and late, and 
suffer you to linger upon earth after the heat and 
burden of the day are over ? If so, enter young, 
enter now, on that life of faith, reverence, and 
love, on which the dew of eternal youth still rests, 
when desire fails, and the weary pilgrim ap- 
proaches his long home. 

In speaking of old age, I ought to recur to the 
discipline of severe trial and desolating sorrow, 
through which alone we can reach declining years. 
For this discipline, the merely intellectual life has 
no resource. Its route must lie by many graves ; 
but it leads not by the Redeemer's broken sepul- 
chre. Its path is through much tribulation ; but 
it points not the troubled spirit to the mansions 
in the Father's house. These severe sorrows bow 
down the strong man, yea, the strongest, and may 
bow him in hopeless despondency, and make him 
drag through the residue of his days a burden of 
incessant pain and weariness. And are you will- 
ing to encounter the withering of early hopes, the 
sore bereavements, the intense sufferings, which 
lie more or less in the path of all, without any- 
thing higher or better to sustain you than the cold 
philosophy of the irreligious world, which can only 
bid you bear and throw oif as you can, by your 
own unaided strength, evils, in themselves unre- 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 217 

lieved and unmitigated, which you cannot avert 
and cannot remedy ? Arc you willing to move on 
through these gloomy passages of your pilgrim- 
age, without having them lighted and cheered by 
rays of hope, love, and promise ? The life of the 
affections leads through these gloomy passages ; 
but they are not wholly dark. It has faith in a 
fatherly Providence, which can inflict no useless 
evil. It is sustained by the consciousness of an 
omnipotent presence and support. It enjoys the 
felt companionship and sympathy of the suffering, 
glorified Saviour, and the communion of those 
who through faith and patience inherit the prom- 
ises. It beholds the reconciled countenance of 
God, and commands, high above clouds and dark- 
ness, an ever nearer view of heaven. Its way 
leads by tombs ; but they are all open, — the res- 
urrection angel has rolled the great stone away, 
and sits upon it. Its path is through much trib- 
ulation ; but the glory of the eternal kingdom 
rests upon it. With reference to these trials, then, 
which you cannot shun, let me entreat you to en- 
ter on that life of piety and love which can sanctify 
them for you and you by them, — which will mark 
each sorrow by a new stage heavenward, — which 
will make every season of affliction a time of 
peaceful trust in God, and deep, fervent joy in the 
holy spirit. 

Finally, it becomes every prudent man and 
woman, every discreet youth, to take some ac- 
id 



218 THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 

count of that only event, death, which is sure to 
all. You all believe, I doubt not, in God and in 
immortality. You cannot help believing, in some 
form, in the certainty of a righteous retribution. 
— in the consequences of this earthly life as 
reaching out, for joy or woe to every soul, into 
the boundless future. You cannot help feeling 
yourselves accountable to the Author of your life 
and the God of eternity. And can you omit all 
recognition of him in prayer, praise, and duty, 
and yet feel safe ? Did you know death to be 
close at hand, as it may be, is there anything in 
the mere attainments and exercise of a vigorous 
and cultivated intellect, which would nerve you to 
meet the last hour with serenity, confidence, and 
hope ? Would not the deepest self-reproach fasten 
upon your soul, because you had not owned God 
in all your ways, and oiFered your mind and 
heart a living sacrifice to him ? And would not 
the pungency of this self-reproach be in precise 
proportion to the talents which you had kept un- 
consecrated ? Many live as if they occupied a 
position which exempted them from the cultiva- 
tion and exercise of the religious affections, ex- 
cused them from allegiance to their Saviour, and 
absolved them from every law but that of judi- 
cious and dignified self-love. But no man, con- 
sciously on his death-bed, ever felt himself an 
exempt. There is for the dying but one style of 
character by which they can ever be persuaded 



THE LIFE OF THE AFFECTIONS. 219 

to measure their spirits ; and that is the life of 
piety and love, which I have now sought to set 
before you. This, and this only, can give peace 
in death. But this fears no evil, as the valley of 
the shadow opens. The life of mere intellect 
death breaks off abruptly. Those paths, which 
it can pursue with grovelling steps and earth- 
bound vision, have no issues beyond the grave. 
The life of the affections death suspends not; 
but only merges it in the unchanging friendship 
and undying love of heaven. Its path is that on 
which the Saviour passed from mortal conflict 
and agony home to the throne of God. Tongues 
shall indeed fail, and knowledge in its earthly 
uses cease ; but love, born of God, and heir of 
heaven, — love never faileth. 



SERMON XYII 



TEUE LIFE. 

MAN DOTH NOT LIVE BY BREAD ONLY ; BUT BY EVERY WORD 
THAT PROCEEDETH OUT OF THE MOUTH OP THE LORD DOTH 

MAN LIVE. — Deuteronomy viii. 3. 

What is the life for which we seek and hope ? 
Mere existence ? No. But conscious happiness, 

— an existence which we feel to be a blessing, 

— a large preponderance of success over disap- 
pointment, and joy over sorrow. This is what 
all desire ; but they seek it in different ways. 
On the memorable occasion on which our Saviour 
quoted these words, he had sought it by a fast of 
forty days in the wilderness. And those were 
days of peace, joy, and victory ; for they were 
passed in the bosom of the Father, in communion 
with God and heaven, in the girding of the spirit 
for those mighty and incessant labors, for that 
living and dying sacrifice, by which man, the 
wanderer and the sinner, was to be redeemed, 
reconciled, and brought home to God. The 
tempter came. Bread in the desert might have 



TRUE LIFE. 221 

grown from the very stones. Jewelled crowns 
and sceptres were laid at liis feet. It was by 
tliese things that men sought to live. But to 
Christ they were not life. The word of God was 
his only life ; to do the will of the Father, liis 
meat and drink ; to finish the work of toil and 
blood, his crown and kingdom. 

Our text suggests two theories of life ; — the 
one, the living by bread alone ; the other, by obe- 
dience, duty, and love, by angels' food, by the 
manna that comes down from heaven. Let us 
consider both ; and may God grant "us grace to 
make the choice which was made by Him who 
for our sakes was tempted without sin, and who 
will strengthen us, as we are partakers in his 
temptation, to bear part also in his victory. 

Man doth not live by bread only. Yet multi- 
tudes think thus to live, — by things outward 
and eartldy, by the accumulation of material, 
perishable objects of enjoyment, or of wealth, 
which can represent and command them all. 
The general sentiment of society most mani- 
festly is, — "Money, wealth, is the great end of 
life, the one thing needful for happiness, the 
chief criterion and measure of success and at- 
tainment. Money answereth all things. Give 
us this, — give us the means of living as we 
please, and a constantly growing surplus fund 
beyond our immediate wants, and we have the 
supreme good. With tliis, whatever mental or 

19* 



222 TRUE LIFE. 

moral endowments we can get without trouble 
and keep without care, we will not reject ; but, 
without money, no intellectual treasure, no emi- 
nence of moral worth, can suffice for our happi- 
ness. Let us first seek that which is outward ; 
and let the kingdom within take thought for it- 
self, — at least, we will waste upon it no super- 
fluous care or effort." If such be not the com- 
mon language of society, what means this tu- 
multuous striving, this trepidation, eagerness, 
and anxiety in the pursuit of every form of out- 
ward good, this earnest struggle to get and to 
keep what is earthly and perishing ? Yet few 
have made the trial for any length of time, with- 
out experiences adapted to re-echo the voice of 
holy writ, — " Man doth not live by bread only." 
There are chambers of the soul which nothing 
earthly can fill. There are in the region of the 
affections waste places which remain always deso- 
late in the worldly heart. There is in the spirit 
of man a home which the Infinite God made for 
himself, which no inferior tenant can occupy, and 
which, when he dwells not within, feels the pain- 
ful void. There are, in the native constitution 
of the soul, niches for all the kindly social affec- 
tions ; and where these affections are not cher- 
ished, there must needs be a sense of vacuity and 
loneliness, even in the most prosperous earthly 
condition. There must be all the while a latent 
consciousness that the soul is not fed or satisfied, 



TRUE LIFE. 223 

— that it has acquiesced in something far below 
its birthright. There cannot fail to- bo heard at 
times, from objects of the fondest pursuit and 
confidence, a voice saying, — " We cannot meet 
and fill the cravings of the immortal spirit." 
And it is to this voice, ill understood, misinter- 
preted, tliat we are, as I suppose, to impute the 
effort of so many for an amount of earthly good 
beyond all possible power of enjoyment. Their 
first visions of happiness are of a mere compe- 
tence. That attained, but happiness still beyond 
their grasp, they aim at wealtli, and are led on in 
the blind chase, always supposing that the prize, 
which has hitlierto eluded their grasp, lies at the 
goal next in siglit. 

Apart from tlie unsatisfying nature of this 
grovelling mode of life at all times, there are 
peculiar seasons when its barrenness must be 
most keenly felt. When that on which one has 
reposed his whole confidence is threatened or 
withdrawn, how rayless must be his every pros- 
pect and retrospect ! His gods are taken, and 
what has he more ? The mad-house or the sui- 
cide's grave has too often been the resting-place 
of tliose whose only trust was in outward posses- 
sions. Nor is there any form of affliction so de- 
void of resource or of consolation as the liopeless 
loss of earthly good to him who has desired and 
sought nothing higlier or better. 

In those other, and, to a true heart, incompar- 



224 TRUE LIFE. 

ably keener, sorrows reserved for almost every 
man, what agency of relief or consolation can be 
expected from that which the multitude so ear- 
nestly seek and so dearly prize ? Can wealth sus- 
tain or comfort the bereaved husband or father ? 
When the strong ties of natural affection are sun- 
dered, is it a solace to know that they had been 
gilded and jewelled ? If they were not strength- 
ened and sanctified by Christian communion, by 
the fellowship of heaven-seeking souls, — if the 
only common mterests have been sordid and 
grovelling, then has the prosperity enjoyed to- 
gether left the survivor only the heavier burden 
of remembrances not again to be realized, and of 
joys for ever fled. 

For him, who has sought to live for and by 
mere outward and earthly good, it is also ap- 
pointed to die ; and it seems to me that the 
most inveterate wx)rshipper of Mammon might 
be converted to spiritual desires, longings, and 
efforts, if he would only stand by a coffin, gaze 
on the clay-cold features of the dead, hearkei? 
with the spirit's ear to their teachings, and re- 
main, eyes and heart intent on that most elo- 
quent of scenes, till its voices had all been 
uttered. "Was he who lies there fortunate, pros- 
perous, rich ? Did he fare sumptuously, and sur- 
round himself, in the world's heartless phrase, 
with all that heart could desire ? If so, what 
did all this avail him on the death-bed or at the 



TRUE LIFE. 225 

judgment-scat ? Has aught that he had gone 
with him to purchase special immunities or priv- 
ileges in heaven ? Has his inventory been regis- 
tered on the Lamb's book of life, and have the 
harps of the redeemed rung in louder notes of 
welcome for him ? If he was a follower of Christ, 
did any added consolation flow in upon his de- 
parting spirit from what he was going to leave 
behind him? Or rather, was not his sole re- 
pose, in dying, on that Rock of Ages which 
proffers equal shelter for the homeless and 
friendless saint ? But did he trust in riches ? 
Then, in death and at the judgment was that 
wherein he trusted transformed, from a talent 
which he might have used for God's glory and 
man's good, into a millstone about his neck, 
weighing him down to the depths of despair. 

Such are the leading features of the life which 
sustains itself by bread alone, and which is out- 
ward and earthly in all its resources, aims, plans, 
and hopes. But such is not the life which God 
has ordained for us. " Man doth not live by 
bread only ; but by every word that proceedeth 
out of the mouth of God, by that doth he live." 
As this is no less true of our outward life than it 
was of that of the manna-fed Israelites, it is em- 
phatically true of the life of the soul. Its only 
liappiness is in the word of God, in his law of 
duty, lioliness, and love. We, who have always 
lived in comfort and affluence, and have known 



226 TRUE LIFE. 

no sharp suffering or severe priration, find it hard 
to divest ourselves of the feeling, that very many 
outward things are absolutely essential to our 
happiness, and that our peace is in some measure 
in the keeping of that which passing events may 
give or take away. Yet there are in our congre- 
gation those who could teach us a different lesson. 
Some of the happiest persons that we know have 
no earthly inheritance save the kindness and char- 
ity of their Christian friends. I have never wit- 
nessed greater elasticity of spirit, a fuller flow of 
gladness, or a warmer interest in the prosperity 
of others, than among those whom a careless ob- 
server would have registered among the forsaken 
and the wretched. 

What, then, are the elements of this higher 
life ? Since man, spiritually speaking, cannot 
live by bread only, by what is he to live ? 

First, by faith, — faith in an all-seeing Fa- 
ther, whose sceptre ruletli over all, and who, 
if our hearts are his, will cause all things out- 
ward to work together for our good, — faith in 
a Redeemer, who has loved us and given him- 
self for us as our Saviour from sin, and our 
Guide to duty and heaven. What a priceless 
privilege, in a life of unceasing change, to look 
beyond manifest good and seeming evil to the 
throne of love, whence both are sent in equal 
mercy to our souls, — and to feel assured, that, 
in a world not man's, but God's, our lot is or- 



TRUE LIFE. 227 

dered and our path directed by one who loves 
us better than we can love ourselves ! Deprive 
me of this faith, and the burden even of a pros- 
perous life would seem insupportable ; for I 
should apprehend that I might have been lift- 
ed on high, and spared long, only for some 
more appalling doom. But give me this faith, 
firm and constant, in a fatherly Providence, in 
the minute and incessant care of the Almighty ; 
and my heart, thus strengthened, could not lose 
its cheerfulness under trials, however intense or 
desolating. How inestimably rich, also, is the 
solace that we may derive from looking to Jesus, 
our divine fellow-sufferer, and remembering, as 
the waves of sorrow break over us, or as the 
valley of death opens before us, that his crown of 
thorns has become the diadem of his truest glory, 
and his cross the sceptre of his universal sway ! 

Again, man, by the appointment of God, is to 
live by hope, — by the hope of heaven, which 
alone can anchor the soul amidst the fitful for- 
tunes of our earthly pilgrimage. It is this hope 
that equalizes human conditions as to their ca- 
pacity for happiness, and enables us to cast aside 
doubt and fear as to what lies before us on the 
path of life. Travellers to a better country, sure 
as faith can make us of a safe conveyance thither, 
why need we be over-anxious as to the mere in- 
cidents of our journey ? I know not what earth- 
ly lot we might not thankfully welcome, for the 



228 TRUE LIFE* 

experience which it might afford of our Father's 
presence, and the advantages which it might fur- 
nish for a consecrated walk to heaven ; for every 
lot, nay, each seeming extreme of good and evil, 
has its own stern discipline, its blessed baptism, 
as it may prove, of severe trial, and each has its 
peculiar seasons of refreshing from the Divine 
presence, and its foreshinings of heavenly joy. 

By God's appointment, we are also to nourish 
our souls by charity, by sympathy with our breth- 
ren, by bearing their burdens and helping their 
joys. There can be no life worth living with- 
out brotherly love, — without a ready heart and 
hand for the needy, the suffering, and the err- 
ing. What a vast power of happiness, what a 
treasury of glad experiences, lies locked up all 
around us, in the talents which we will not use, 
the time which we will not spare, the money 
which we will not bestow, for our poor and af- 
flicted fellow-mortals ! We act too often as if 
we were afraid to be happy. We linger on the 
brink of a new charity, as we would on the verge 
of a precipice, and frequently draw back and con- 
tract ourselves into a narrower sphere of being 
than was ours before. What more pitiful sight 
than a man, with abundant leisure, with large 
capacities of usefulness, with ample wealth, vast- 
ly beyond the possibility of need, yet as much 
afraid of doing good as he ought to be of selling 
his soul, shrinking with a cold sneer from every 



TRUE LIFE. 229 

mode of religious or moral activity or benevo- 
lence, contentedly leaving the wretched and de- 
graded in their sin and suffering, and, when 
forced for decency's sake to render some little 
aid to a fellow-being, doling it out as he would 
measure drop by drop his own heart's blood ? 
And yet this very man, if he would only look 
into his own heart, would find that the paltry 
sums thus bestowed, pitiful as they were in pro- 
portion to his wealth, had purchased him his 
happiest moments, and thus yielded him an in- 
terest which the untouched bulk of his estate 
can never pay. 

But I would not speak of charity as the priv- 
ilege of the rich alone, but as the right and duty, 
nay, as the essential nourishment, of every soul 
that truly lives. Nor does it imply abundant 
means, leisure, or capacity. Its law is, — " Be 
merciful after thy power. If thou hast much, 
give plenteously. If thou hast little, do thy dili- 
gence gladly to give of that little. And what- 
ever else thou hast or hast not, give thy heart." 
Let there be no barrier of indifference, coldness, 
or selfishness between you and any child of God. 
Account every man as your brother. Feel that 
you are one of the universal family, bound to all 
its members in indissoluble kindred. Say, with 
the heathen poet, — " I am a man, and I account 
nothing that concerns man as indifferent to me." 
Thus will your own sphere of being be indefi- 

20 



230 TRUE LIFE. 

nitely enlarged, and your fountain of life kept 
full. 

Finally, our true life must be connected with, 
and flow from, the testimony of a good con- 
science, which, if merited, no outward condition 
can suppress or pervert. Were we in the habit 
of looking within as constantly as we ought, how 
full and sufficient a source of gladness might this 
be ! Suppose that every morning and evening 
there came to us the audible voice of God, say- 
ing, — "I have chosen thee, — I have loved 
thee, — thou art mine, — I will guide thee by 
my counsel on earth, and afterward receive thee 
to glory," — would not this voice make us su- 
premely happy, let the world smile or frown, let 
the current of our affairs roll with a smooth or a 
turbid stream ? And what but this voice, more 
than audible, pervading every chamber and re- 
cess of the inner man, is the testimony which 
conscience bears to the good and faithful ser- 
vant ? Why should it not breathe perfect joy ? 
To know, that, with all our infirmities and sins, it 
has yet been our endeavor to walk before God in 
a prayerful and trusting spirit, — to look around 
among our fellow-men, and see not one towards 
whom we have knowingly and willingly violated 
the law of equity and love, — to be conscious 
also of an inward desire and longing after the 
things that are true and excellent, — this is in- 
deed the shining of heaven into the soul of man. 



TRUE LIFE. 231 

Of the spirit -^hicli bears these traits it may well 
be said, — " The glory of God doth lighten it, 
and the Lamb is the light thereof." 

This testimony of a good conscience is a treas- 
ure which evil times and untrustworthy men not 
only liave no power to take from us, but may even 
render more sure and availing as a source of con- 
tentment and joy. By it I have known men made 
far happier in a reduced fortune than they had 
been in affluence. In what were called their bet- 
ter days, though they lived at peace with God and 
man, they did not give themselves time to enter 
into intimate communion with their own souls, 
and to feed on the heavenly manna, which falls 
only when the world is calm and still. But when 
reverses came, they found unspeakable solace in 
the reflection, that God had taken only what 
they had honestly gained and generously used, 
that they had made duty the soul of business, 
and had not been driven by the love of lucre 
to forsake the law of God or to violate the cov- 
enant of their Redeemer. 

Faith, hope, charity, their gifts sealed by a 
conscience void of offence, — it is by these things 
that men live, — in these alone is the life of the 
sonl. Be faithful, sincere, upright, beneficent. 
Honor God and bless man with heart and soul, 
with mind and strength. And then commit the 
outward affairs of life, in calm faith, to the guid- 
ance and disposal of a kind Providence, assured 



232 TRUE LIFE. 

that the soul at peace with God is above them 
all, sufficient through divine support for its own 
well-being and happiness in time and through 
eternity. 

Such are the heaven-appointed means of life 
and growth within the reach of all of us. It is 
these that our Saviour proffers to us. They were 
his peace and joy. They are the fountain still 
flowing at the foot of his cross. Other streams 
there are, sparkling, attractive, rolling over gold- 
en sands and beneath a brilliant sky ; yet there 
is a voice in their murmur, ever saying, — ^* He 
that drinks of us shall thirst again, and thirst as 
often as he comes to draw." But from the moun- 
tain of the beatitudes, and again from the olive- 
shade of Gethsemane, and from the darkness and 
agony of Calvary, I hear the voice, — " If any 
man thirst let him come unto me and drink, 
and the water that I will give him shall be in 
him a well of water springmg up unto everlast' 
ing life." 



SERMON XYIII 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

THE KINGDOM OF GOD COMETH NOT WITH OBSERVATION. — 

Luke xvii. 20. 

In the hallowed calm of a summer Sabbath, 
there is much to remind us of the gentle, noise- 
less, yet all-powerful influence of our religion. 
There are striking and attractive analogies be- 
tween the outward and the spiritual universe. 
The reign of summer, in which we now rejoice, 
came not with observation ; but it has quietly 
stolen upon us, has grown while we were sleep- 
ing, has derived its nutriment from alternate 
sunbeams, dews, and showers, each beautiful in 
its season, but at no one moment suggesting as- 
sociations of intense power. And yet they have 
made the desert blossom, have gladdened the 
forest, and replaced the late sterile, frost-bound 
landscape by gorgeous bloom and rich promise ; 
and they remind us of Him of wliom it was said, 
— " He shall come like rain upon the grass, and 

20* 



234 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

as showers that water the earth " ; and at the 
same time, — " He shall have dominion from sea 
to sea, and from the river to the ends of the 
earth." 

In the realms both of nature and of mind, man 
works with observation, — God, in silence ; man, 
in abrupt, fragmentary efforts, — God, in contin- 
uous and progressive plans, in wliich are at once 
the hidings and the vast results of omnipotence. 
As in harmony with the voices and impressions of 
the season, let us consider the idea of our text, as 
illustrated in the establishment of our Saviour^s 
kingdom on the earth, in its re-establishment in 
the individual soul, and in the healing and sancti- 
fying influences that go forth for society from 
every true subject of his kingdom. 

1. Our Saviour's kingdom, as founded by him 
personally, came " not with observation. " How 
quiet, gentle, unobtrusive, was his passage through 
life ! None could say when his kingdom came. 
There was no sounding of trumpets before him, 
— no ostentatious announcement of the begin- 
ning of liis reign. No series of events could have 
been less conspicuous, no discourses less pretend- 
ing, than those of his ministry. Even his most 
stupendous miracles were wrought in comparative 
retirement, by the death-bed and at the grave-side. 
His days were chiefly spent among the lowly, the 
stricken, and the suffering. When he spoke, it 
was by the way-side or in the fishing-boat, and the 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 235 

passing shower or the opening blossom gave him 
his text. Sometimes his hearers were attracted 
by a story full of stirring imagery and striking in- 
cident, — they listened intently, and the graphic 
words sank into their inmost souls ; yet they knew 
not for months afterwards, that in those words 
were wrapped tlie deepest mysteries of the king- 
dom of heaven. Then, again, with reference to 
some engrossing event or question of the day, he 
littered a few simple, pertinent sayings, so per- 
fectly well-timed, that they seemed adapted to no 
other place or moment ; yet those who heard them 
could not forget them, but found that they suited 
other times and occasions, that they had an ex- 
haustless depth and fulness of meaning, and at 
length that they were the very mind and will of 
the Eternal for all lands and ages. His least for- 
mal utterances could not fade from men's mem- 
ories, but were cherislied as gems of heaven. 
There was no show of a system either in his 
preaching or his life. His ministry lasted but 
little more than a year ; and of tliat a very few 
days only were passed in other company than that 
of unlettered fishermen, and most of the time in 
the desert, on the lake, or in rural hamlets, then 
obscure and despised, though now illustrious, be- 
cause they bore his footprints. He was perpet- 
ually harassed by tlie importunity and wayward- 
ness of his friends, or the captiousness and malice 
of his enemies. He left no written record behind 



236 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

liim ; and his words and deeds were preserved 
in the most miscellaneous form by a few of his 
illiterate followers, whom no impulse short of the 
most affectionate and zealous interest in his mem- 
ory could have induced to become authors. Yet 
when we look at his gospel as a whole, we can say, 
"It is finished." We find nothing that needed 
to be said or done left unsaid or undone. And 
as his disciples, who, on the morning of the as- 
cension, had inquired about his reign as if it were 
yet to begin, looked back upon his works of pow- 
er, his words of love, the agony of the garden, 
and the victory of the cross, they saw that the 
kingdom of God had fully come. The isolated 
threads and colors of his doctrine and his life 
grouped themselves in beautiful symmetry and 
harmony ; and on the canvas where they would 
have thought to see only a few bright, but vague 
and disconnected touches, they beheld a finished 
picture, with the inscription, to which their hearts 
thankfully responded, — " Surely this was the Son 
of God." 

Before unbelieving Jews, and Gentiles too, how 
strikingly true was it that his kingdom came not 
with observation ! The Jews saw in Jesus and 
his followers only a score or two of ignorant fa- 
natics, and thought that they had merely to smite 
the shepherd in order to scatter the flock ; but 
hardly had they smitten him, before his name was 
publicly proclaimed within their temple-walls, and 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 237 

won thousands in a day to its profession and bap- 
tism. The Gentiles supposed the conflict between 
the new religion and the guardians of the ancient 
law to be only a paltry quarrel between rival Jew- 
ish sects, deemed the leader of the new heresy not 
worth crucifying, and advised the Jews to chastise 
him and let him go. But while the generation 
that saw him die yet lived, his cross had been 
made the revered emblem of the faith of thou- 
sands in every part of the vast Roman empire, 
and corrupt rulers and avaricious priests saw that 
a more than rival power had been roused against 
them, and that the kingdom was passing irrevo- 
cably from their grasp. To my mind, this quiet 
establishment of Christianity, without any of the 
usual apparatus of great revolutions, is a conclu- 
sive token of the immediate agency of God in the 
fortunes of the infant Church. No other hand 
could thus have marshalled and put in motion the 
perfect and divine array of means, motives, and 
influences for human salvation, and held forth 
in the eyes of the astonished world the finished 
work, before in the ears of friends or foes had re- 
sounded the startling declaration, — " Behold, I 
make all things new." 

2. The sentiment of our text is verified in in- 
dividual religious experience. Yet it is often 
overlooked or denied. I apprehend that many 
depend for their evidence of the Christian char- 
acter on their being able to mark the precise 



238 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

moment when the kingdom came, rather than on 
tracing the certain proofs of its estahlishment 
within. But in the New Testament we are no- 
where bidden to look to any past epoch for the 
proof that we belong to the family of Christ. Our 
self-searching is constantly directed to tjie present 
state of the motives, affections, and principles. 
" Examine yourselves whether ye be in the faith." 
" If any man have not the spirit of Christ, he is 
none of his. " " He that hath my commandments 
and keepcth them, he it is that loveth me. " In 
many, the growth of the religious character has 
been so silent and gradual, that they can point to 
no decisive moment of change. Some have never 
been destitute of serious impressions. When tliey 
ceased to repeat a prayer from a mother's lips, 
they commenced praying for themselves, and have 
perhaps never passed a day of their lives since in- 
fancy without thoughts of God and duty. Now, 
though in such persons there has been a new and 
spiritual birth, — a transition from the state in 
which they were the passive recipients of religious 
thoughts from their parents to that in which, with 
full understanding and deep emotion, they made 
choice for themselves of the better part, — it is a 
transition of which they cannot be expected to 
mark the stages, as they could, had they ever led 
an utterly vicious or irreligious life. Such per- 
sons, born and brought up as within temple-gates, 
and self-consecrated from early childhood, have 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 239 

never known the thraldom of the world's yoke, or 
the bitterness of its unrequited service, and have 
therefore escaped those agonizing experiences by 
wliicli others can mark their entrance into the 
kingdom of God. 

Among those, also, who were formerly negligent 
of religious duty, and worldly in their prevalent 
tastes, desires, and feelings, yet free from tliose 
expressly sinful habits of speech and conduct 
which need an abrupt and sudden change, there 
are, no doubt, many who have been awakened and 
drawn heavenward so gradually, that they can de- 
fine no season when regeneration took place. All 
that they can say is, — " Once I was blind ; now 
I see. Once my heart was a stranger to the re- 
ligious affections ; now I love to pray, my heart 
promptly turns to God, and I delight to seek out 
and follow my Saviour's footmarks." In such a 
case, the kingdom of God has no doubt come ; 
but it came not with observation. There has 
been godly sorrow for sin ; but it was gentle in 
its flow, was blended with the hope of pardon, 
and cheered by the promises of God. There has 
bec;i an entire change of character ; but it was 
wrought step by step. The change commenced 
with prayer ; and tlie soul had begun to pray be- 
fore it was fully conscious of it. First came the 
momentary appeal, the silent upbreathing of the 
spirit to God. This soon prolonged itself into 
musings on the concerns of eternity. It next 



240 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

took form and words, and sought fit places and 
seasons for communion with the Father. Tlien 
it gradually spread itself through the life into a 
daily walk with God. And this spirit of prayer 
has subdued, one by one, the unspiritual traits 
and habits of the soul, has sanctified its once 
worldly tastes, has carried on and up into the 
boundless future its desires and aspirations, has 
rayed itself out in the every-day life and conver- 
sation, and established a new law, and breathed a 
new spirit, for common scenes, cares, and duties, 
so that the very habits which were mere outward 
decencies have become Christian virtues, and the 
very acts which used to be performed for the 
praise of men are now wrought with a single eye 
to the Divine approval. Thus, in the passage of 
many of the sincerest Christians from darkness 
into God's marvellous light, has the dawn broken 
so gradually upon their vision, that they could 
not say when night gave place to day. 

It seems to me that the religious experience 
of the faithful eleven among our Lord's apostles 
must have been of this stamp. When they were 
called, they appear to have been decent, soJ)er, 
thoughtful men, but exceedingly unspiritual, and 
with an immense change to be wrought before 
they reached the full Christian stature. But we 
read in their history of no precise moment when 
either of them passed from darkness to light. 
Their growth in grace was very gradual. Even at 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 241 

the Last Supper, worldly ambition -had not wholly 
yielded to the hope of a heavenly inheritance ; 
and after the resurrection, we find them still slow 
of heart. But from the seed of the kingdom, 
sown in tears and watered with blood by the Man 
of Sorrows, there sprang up at length in their 
souls a fervor, spirituality,* and self-consecration, 
which the world has not yet seen equalled, and 
can never see surpassed. 

For a different class of the regenerate, I well 
know that the coming of the kingdom of God is 
preceded by a violent inward convulsion, and an 
agony of intense sorrow. The conflict is a death- 
struggle ; and in contrast with its gloom and ter- 
ror, the quietness that succeeds it seems more 
than the peace of heaven. This violent form of 
religious experience, when not directly flowing 
from harsh and repulsive views of the Divine 
character, is most apt to take place when the pre- 
vious life has been one either of confirmed obdu- 
racy or of open and manifest guilt. And in these 
cases it is not the reign of God that comes with 
violence, but the kingdom of sin that passes away 
as in a whirlwind. The fierce convulsion and 
agony of soul are the casting down of the thrones, 
that the Ancient of Days may sit, — that the gen- 
tle and peaceful Jesus may come in and reign. 
Satan falls like lightning ; the spirit of God de- 
scends like a dove. The old heavens may be 
rolled together as a scroll, and pass away with a 

21 



242 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

great noise ; but the new lieavens and earth, 
wherein dwelleth righteousness, are swept by no 
stormy breath. 

Let it not be inferred from what I have said, 
that I would establish a low or lax standard of 
Christian character. The contrary is my desire 
and aim. I not only think, but know, that the 
occurrence of pungent religious experiences at 
some past time is a delusive and dangerous test of 
character. I know avowed infidels, who in their 
earlier days passed through the agony of contri- 
tion, and the ecstasy of relief and imagined par- 
don. I know those who, relying on such remem- 
brances, have grown remiss in duty, and relapsed 
into utter worldliness of spirit and character. I 
have known those who have carried to the very 
borders of the grave the assurance that they were 
Christians, on the ground that they had once been 
converted, who yet, in the judgment of the broad- 
est charity, had lived for many years without any 
apparent sense of religious obligation and duty. 
Nay, I have known this whole convulsive process 
passed through in a time of violent sickness, with- 
out leaving any distinct traces on the memory 
when health returned. But there are questions 
which would to God I might induce each of you 
to ask himself before he sleeps, and to feel that 
liis position in the spiritual universe, his lot in 
the event of death, depends upon the answer. 
They are these. What is my present frame of 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 243 

heart and character ? Am I living as a child of 
God and an immortal being? Do I sincerely 
pray, and that daily and habitually ? Is God 
much in my tlioughts, and does the conscious- 
ness of his presence enter into my daily life, and 
form an element in my thoughts, plans, and pur- 
poses ? Is his will, as such, my law ? Do I sin- 
cerely love my Saviour, and is his example my 
rule and measure of duty? Are my thoughts 
much in lieavcn, and does the power of the world 
to come govern my heart and breathe in my daily 
walk and conversation ? These are momentous 
questions ; for they relate to the fundamental 
laws of the kingdom of God. If you can answer 
them in the affirmative, the kingdom has come 
in your soul, tliougli it may not have been with 
observation. Otherwise, whatever may be your 
remembered experience, the work of repentance 
and regeneration remains for you ; and through 
no other gate can the kingdom be entered. 

There is yet another error to which we are lia- 
ble, in judging whether the kingdom of God has 
come in the heart. It is that of substituting out- 
ward mechanical activity for vital piety. Showy, 
ostentatious forms of duty and benevolence are 
frequently demanded as a test of character. Men 
vie with each other in the cry, — " Come, see my 
zeal for the Lord ! " and often are the domestic 
altar, and those walks of quiet duty on wliich no 
trumpet sounds before one's steps and no applaud- 



244 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

ing multitude shouts behind, forsaken and neg- 
lected for such works as are to be wrought with 
shout and song. These last works must, indeed, 
be wrought, though it would be well to dispense 
with the shout and song. But let none imagine 
that an engagedness and ardor, which crave the 
excitement of sympathy and crowds, indicate the 
establishment of the kingdom of God in the heart. 
God reigns in the stillness of home, in the si- 
lent night-watches, in the lonely path of duty, 
in those unostentatious charities in which one 
hand knows not what the other does, in patience, 
forbearance, and long-suiFering, in rigid, mi- 
nute conscientiousness, in the thousand nameless 
thoughts and words of which man can take no 
note, but which have their record on high. 

The sentiment of our text is beautifully illus- 
trated in many of the instrumentalities which 
God employs to bring men into his kingdom. I 
have time now to speak, in this connection, only 
of his afflictive Providence, in which we cannot 
but admire the analogy^etween the natural and 
the spiritual harvest-field. The sower sows his 
seed, and early drought checks its upspringing. 
Day after day rises in vernal glory and sets in 
beauty; yet the husbandman waits in vain for 
the hope of the year. At length, the sky is over- 
cast, the heavy rain falls, and the whole landscape 
looks more dreary and desolate than winter. But 
when the sun reappears, every seed has germi- 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 245 

nated, and every furrow presents its rank of green 
blades, which have drawn vital nutriment from 
the drenching showers, and will in due time at- 
test in rich, ripe harvest the blessing of the early 
rain. Thus do seeds of Heaven's planting often 
lie dormant in the soul of man. Life's happy 
days rise and set without a cloud, — scenes of 
gladness and hope pass before the soul ; and yet 
there is no spiritual growth, no heavenward move- 
ment or aspiration. Thick, unbroken clods of 
earth press down the heavenly seed. Affliction 
comes, blighting, desolating. Cherished joys are 
withered ; the fondest hopes disappointed ; the 
idols of earthly love laid low. The soul for a 
season lies prostrate and in darkness, and neither 
sun nor stars appear for many days. But as the 
cloud passes away, the soul finds itself enriched 
and blessed. The seed which had long been 
choked has found room to grow. There spring 
up better thoughts, higher purposes, desires, and 
affections, that lay hold on heaven. The king- 
dom of God comes, thougli not with observation, 
not recognized at first in the atmosphere of sad- 
ness that encircles the home and heart, but soon 
shedding over the desolate home and the grief- 
stricken heart a peace more profound and a high- 
er joy than had been felt or conceived before. 

3. But I must pass to the last topic proposed 
for our consideration, — the sentiment of our text 
as illustrated in the influence of Christian char- 

21* 



246 THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 

acter ; and of this I can speak but briefly. The 
Christian is indeed bound to exert himself in ex- 
press modes of benevolent activity ; and, in these 
days of abounding iniquity and of earnest striv- 
ing against sin, it is a mystery to me how any 
Christian can answer to his conscience or his God, 
if he lets not his voice be heard and his example 
distinctly witnessed and felt on the right side, in 
the great conflict now going on against the vari- 
ous forms of self-degradation and social wrong, 
— in the cause of temperance, freedom, and hu- 
manity. But the tru.e disciple, when he has said 
and done all that he can in these causes, has ex- 
hausted but a small part of his influence. Most 
of it is silent and unobserved, — quiet as the dew 
on a midsummer night, but like the dew fructi- 
fying. It is impossible to estimate the good that 
may flow from the simple, unpretending dis- 
charge of common duties, — from the application 
of a Christian conscience to the little daily details 
of business and social and domestic intercourse. 
There are numberless things in ordinary life, 
which will be said and done in an indescribably 
different way and spirit by the Christian and 
the mere man of the world ; and the difference, 
though it could not be defined, will be distinctly 
felt, and will make the Christian life a perpetual 
benediction to all who come within its influence. 
Conversance with such consistent exemplars of 
the religious character is among the choicest 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD. 247 

means of grace tliat God ever uses ; and in the 
day when the secrets of all hearts shall be re- 
vealed, and when the zealous mover of benevo- 
lent macliinery, who yet has neglected to keep 
his own heart, and the unostentatious Christian, 
who thinks that he has done nothing great, shall 
stand side by side- in the judgment, it will no 
doubt be in favor of the latter that the sentence 
will go forth, — " Take ye the talent from the 
unprofitable servant, and give it to him that hath 
ten talents." Many souls, that knew not whence 
they first derived their better impulses and prin- 
ciples, so gentle was the influence of the good 
man's example, will see in the light of eternity 
that it was the outflow of his spirit, the calm and 
quiet beauty of holiness in his life, that won their 
hearts to the love of Christ, and awoke in them 
the germs of penitence, faith, and prayer. Thus 
in the kingdom of heaven will many that are 
least be made greatest ; and no soul that has sin- 
cerely loved the Saviour will be left without the 
blessing promised to those who turn sinners to 
righteousness, and the disobedient to the wisdom 
of the just. 



SERMON XIX 



THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 

IP THE LORD WERE PLEASED TO KILL US, HE WOULD NOT 
HAVE RECEIVED A BURNT-OFFERING AND A MEAT-OFFERINO 
AT OUR HANDS, NEITHER WOULD HE HAVE SHOWED US ALL 
THESE THINGS, NOR WOULD AS AT THIS TIME HAVE TOLD 
US SUCH THINGS AS THESE. — JudgCS xiu. 23. 

Manoah feared that he and his wife were going 
to be destroyed, because they had been visited by 
an angel of God. Our text is his wife's reply to 
hinoL. The heavenly messenger had come and de- 
parted in fearful splendor, and there was much 
in the scenes that they had witnessed adapted to 
inspire them with awe and terror. But he had 
accepted their offerings, had conversed with them 
familiarly and kindly, and had made disclosures 
of God's merciful purposes to them and their 
household ; and, setting these things over against 
the terrific appearances that had alarmed Manoah, 
his wife rightly inferred that the angel had come 
on an errand of unmingled love. 



THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 249 

Wc often need to apply a similar train of rea- 
soning to the mysteries of Providence. God's 
angels come to us in fearful forms, — the angels 
of disease, desolation, and death. Their wings 
brood long over our dwellings. For some of us, 
their ministries come with appalling frequency. 
They often inflict what seems at first sight un- 
mingled evil. Tliey palsy the strength which 
had wrought only in the service of God and 
man. They unnerve the arm which was the 
sole support of helpless infancy or age. They 
take large portions of his stewardship from the 
faithful steward. They remove from our keep- 
ing children wliom we had vowed to train for 
lieaven. Tliey destroy lives that seemed most 
essential to the dearest interests of religion and 
humanity. At such times the murmuring heart 
will say in distrust, — " Why hast thou done 
thus ? " The one calamitous event often stands 
out by itself. Nothing has gone before it to 
interpret it, or to lighten its severity ; nothing 
has accompanied it for our special relief or sol- 
ace ; and nothing has as yet followed it in the 
world without, or in our own experience, to jus- 
tify the ways of God, and to sustain submission 
by reason. Were there only room to suppose so, 
the infliction would seem arbitrary and wanton ; 
and, if considered by itself, might be thouglit 
to proceed from a God who laughed at our ca- 
lamity and mocked when our fear came, — from 



2o0 THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 

a capricious and malignant tyrant, and not from 
our Father. 

I say, that, in individual cases, there might be 
room for the suspicion of malevolence and vin- 
dictiveiiess on the part of the Supreme Arbiter of 
our destinies. In point of fact, this has been the 
prevalent belief everywhere save under Christian 
culture. A large share of divine caprice and 
malignity has entered into every form of poly- 
theism ; and the idea of revenge and needless, 
wanton mischief on the part of the gods has led 
to the most inhuman and revolting forms of pro- 
pitiation and sacrifice. And the Jews, forbidden 
to attach such ideas to their God, and yet unable 
to account for these isolated instances of dire 
calamity and suffering in a world full of divine 
mercy, imputed many of the most appalling forms 
of physical evil to the agency of demons, thus 
cutting off for themselves the sources of consola- 
tion which they might have derived from the re- 
ligious views presented in their sacred writings. 
tinder these mysterious visitations of Providence, 
we are driven, or rather we gladly have recourse, 
to reasoning like that in our text. We appeal to 
other and more frequent experiences, in which 
the Divine mercy has been manifest, — to sor- 
rows which have been sanctified to our growth 
in grace, and to our long seasons of unmingled 
and unclouded happiness. We survey the lead- 
mg features of the plan of Providence, and then 



THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 251 

s37j If, by the present sorrow, God meant to 
crush us to the earth, if it came even on an er- 
rand of doubtful mercy, the past could not liave 
been what it has been. Divine love could not 
thus have followed us step by step, and hour by 
hour, only to prepare for us a severer fall and a 
deeper gloom. In tracing out this thought, let 
us follow the order suggested by our text. 

" If the Lord were pleased to kill us, he would 
not have received a hurnt-offering at our hands." 
Burnt-offerings, under the Jewish law, were pure 
and spotless victims, wholly consumed without 
reservation. They were ordained as an expres- 
sion of trust and gratitude, and, when offered in 
sincerity, brought the Divine blessing upon the 
home and heart of the worshipper. Have not 
burnt-offerings from our households gone up to 
God, — lambs without fault or stain, not indeed 
selected by ourselves, but chosen by the Most 
High, — taken wholly from us, consumed, lost to 
the outward sight, — their unseen spirits mount- 
ing to the upper heaven, as the smoke from the 
ancient altars rose to the sky ? These utter, en- 
tire sacrifices many of us have been constrained 
to make, and have made them in unspeakable 
agony ; yet have afterwards confessed that they 
were not so much taken from us, as accepted at 
our hands. These bereavements liave left bless- 
ings in their train. When met and borne in 
faith, they have given us new experience of spir- 



252 THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 

itiial joj. They have opened new fountains of 
inward life. They have bound us by new and 
stronger ties to the unseen world. The hearts to 
which our own so closely clung have borne us 
with them heavenward. Tliey have led us to 
a nearness and familiarity of feeling with refer- 
ence to heaven, which can subsist in no soul 
that has not near kindred there. These events 
have weakened the power of temptation and the 
yoke of sin. They have made our growth of 
character more sure and rapid. They have en- 
larged our circle of sympathy and our power of 
usefulness. They have borne for us " the peace- 
able fruits of righteousness." As, in the rude 
form of worship permitted by God till Jesus 
offered himself on Calvary, the Israelite bore 
to the altar the fairest of his flock, the pet 
lamb that knew his voice and fed from liis 
hand, with many regretful thouglits, and yet 
in coming months felt that for his act of piety 
a double blessing rested on field and fold, basket 
and store, — so from the most unwilling sacrifice 
that we have been strengthened to offer submis- 
sively at our Father's bidding, there has grown 
the richest spiritual increase. Our sorrows liave 
cut short our sins, nurtured our faitli, given viv- 
idness to our hope, and made our love more and 
more like that of the Universal Father. In new 
sorrows, then, from wliich we have not liad time 
to gather in and count the happy fruits, we will 



THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 253 

hear from like scenes that are past the call to 
trust and gratitude. Did it please God to de- 
stroy us, he would not have accepted our burnt- 
offerhigs. 

Nor yet our meat-offerings. Of the meat-of- 
ferings, only a small portion was consumed, as 
typical of the consecration of the whole, while 
the residue was enjoyed by the priests, or by 
the worshipper himself, with his household and 
friends. Of tlicse offerings the greater part were 
in acknowledgment of the common or pecidiar 
favors of Providence connected with the homes, 
possessions, and families of those who brought 
them. Has our meat-offering, my friends, been 
duly rendered, — our tribute, as God has pros- 
pered us, for his church, his kingdom, and his 
poor ? Have those alms gone forth which may 
sanctify all the rest ? If offered, God has ac- 
cepted and blessed them. And whether we have 
rendered or withholden them, how many are the 
favors, the deliverances, the peculiar mercies of 
our homes, to which we should look back, when 
in any hour of doubt or sorrow a murmuring 
spirit would arraign the Divine goodness ! What 
a talismanic power there is in that one word, — 
home I What a cluster of tender and endearing 
associatiojis does it suggest ! It is the most com- 
plex of all words, and every fold that we open 
in its meaning discloses new depth and richness 
of infinite mercy. The careful husband and fond 

22 



254 THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 

father, the assiduous and loving wife and mother, 
the prattle of infancy, tlie glee of childhood, the 
harmonious circle of brothers and sisters, tlie 
blending of heart with heart and soul with soul, 
the gentle repose of weakness and fear on bolder 
counsel and a stronger arm, the kindly division 
of cares and burdens, the mutually helping hand 
along every steep and rough passage in life, — 
these are but a few of the merciful appointments 
of Him who has set the solitary in families, and 
turned the hearts of parents to children, and of 
children to parents. These home blessings in 
all their fulness we have many of us enjoyed 
for years ; and when some of them have been 
suspended, the greater part have still been spared 
us, and have been made even doubly precious 
through the power of sorrow to refine and en- 
noble the affections. To these mercies, new 
every morning, fresh every evening, borne on 
the wings of every moment, let us look, and 
learn that God is good, when we bow un- 
der those sudden and agonizing afflictions that 
migiit seem sent to crush, and not to heal. Let 
the calm and quiet scenes of home enjoyment, 
which have borne unceasing witness to a pro- 
tecting Providence, shed their light of divine 
love upon our hours of doubt and darkness. 
True, to our half-sealed ears, these desolating 
sorrows blend only notes of wailing and despair 
with the hymn of life ; but they accord with the 



THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 255 

songs of angels and the hosannas of glorified 
spirits, and in the melody of our own hearts, 
if believing and devout, they will flow on from 
sadness to submission, from submission to trust, 
from trust to holy joy, till we enter the golden 
gates, and join the worship of the redeemed. 

To pursue the order of the text, — " If the 
Lord were pleased to kill us, neither would he 
have showed us ail these things. '^^ What has 
he showed us ? What is he daily showing us ? 
How much is there in every scene and form of 
outward nature to rebuke distrust, to quell fear, 
and to make us feel that the world we live in is 
indeed our Father's ! Especially in the summer 
world now around us, so rich in bountiful pro- 
visions, so laden with sights, sounds, and flavors 
designed solely for gratification, how is the truth 
that God is love poured in upon the soul of man 
through every sense and every avenue of enjoy- 
ment ! From the first song of the birds to the 
last ray of mellow twilight, whether in sunshine, 
beneath sheltering clouds, or fresh from the bap- 
tism of the midday shower, the whole scene is 
full of the present and the loving God. He sus- 
tains the wayfaring sparrow. He gives the raven 
his food. He clothes the frail field-flower with 
beauty. He pours gladness into the unnumbered 
insect tribes, — nay, into that minute microscopic 
creation made to fill with sentient life and joy the 
least cramiies and crevices of the universe, that 



256 THE MYSTERIES OP PROVIDENCE. 

no grain of sand or drop of water may fail to re- 
flect the image of the All-merciful. In our sea- 
sons of doubt, darkness, and sorrow, have not 
tliese miracles of Divine care and love a message 
from God for us ? Should they not echo to our 
stricken hearts the words of the Redeemer, — 
" If God so clothe the grass of the field, and feed 
the fowls of the air, shall he not much more care 
for you ? " 

Manoah's wife added, — "If the Lord were 
pleased to kill us, he would not have told us such 
tilings as these." She referred to promised tem- 
poral mercies in her own household. God has 
told us yet more, infinitely more. In the revela- 
tion by Jesus Christ he has revealed to us truths 
and given us promises, which, received in faith, 
must put to flight all hopeless despondency and 
gloom. In Jesus we learn our Father's perfect 
providence and all-embracing love, the kind min- 
istry of earthly disappointment and sorrow, and 
the blessings ordained for those that mourn. He 
tells us of the mansions in the Father's house, 
where our best earthly treasures, when taken from 
us, are garnered for us. He points out his own 
path of trial and suffering as blessed and happy, 
— as full of peace, and light, and joy. He tells 
us of tribulation, but of victory too. We go with 
him. to Gctlisemane and to Calvary ; but we stand 
with him also on the transfiguration and the as- 
cension mount. He tells us that in this world we 



THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 257 

shall have sorrow, but says, — " They that suffer 
with me shall reign with me ; be thou faithful 
unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life." 
In his teachings and in the record of his pilgrim- 
age, we learn all that we can need to know of the 
mysterious dealings of Providence. To interpret 
them fully we cannot expect or hope. But we 
do learn, and are left without a remaining doubt, 
that, when the most severe, they are sent in love, 
— are hidden mercies, designed to discipline our 
faith, to spiritualize our affections, and to draw us 
into closer fellowship with our Saviour's suffer- 
ings, that we may afterwards become partakers of 
his glory. Here, then, let our refuge ever be, 
when sudden and desolating calamity falls upon 
us or ours. Let us go to our Saviour's own words 
on the night of his sorrow. Let us stand in faith 
by his broken sepulchre, and hear from the lips of 
him who was dead and is alive again, — " I am 
the resurrection and the life." 0, could we take 
in anything like an adequate view of the gospel 
revelation, how brief, how unworthy of compar- 
ison with joy boundless and eternal, would seem 
the severest trials of the present state ! Here 
are pardon, salvation, heaven, immortality, offered 
us, — scenes surpassing all imagination spread 
before us, with but a few days of clouded joy and 
bereaved affection at the threshold of our being, 
and then all beyond, if we bear our Saviour's 
image, union, peace, gladness, without limit and 

22* 



258 THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 

without end. Surely, did it please God to destroy 
us, he would not have told us such things as these. 
Only let the soul be filled with these truths, and 
then let sorrows rain down like rattling thunder- 
bolts, — they could not crush or shake it ; but it 
would breathe itself forth in those noble words of 
him who had been caught up into the third heav- 
en, — " None of these things move me, neither 
count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might 
finish my course with joy ; — in all these things 
I am more than conqueror through Him that 
hath loved me." 

These are some of the considerations which 
may sustain us under such mysterious dispensa- 
tions of Providence as lie, no doubt, in the future 
path of most of us. Why these dark events oc- 
cur, it is idle to ask. Were there no mysteries 
in the Divine administration, it would be either 
because we were omniscient, or because God was 
not so. In a beneficent system, embracing all 
worlds and beings, and spanning twin eternities, 
there must needs be events to which a finite mind 
cannot assign their true place and office. Did 
we see and know all, where would be faith, with 
its sisterhood of Christian graces, — faith, which 
makes us children of God and heirs of heaven, — 
faith, which must precede sight and knowledge, 
as in a higher state of being we learn ever more 
and more of the plan of universal Providence, 
and yet must ever pause and worship before mys- 



THE MYSTERIES OF PROVIDENCE. 259 

teries still unrevealed ? Let us thankfully take 
whatever discipline the Father sends, and, if it 
disclose not at once its meaning and its ministry, 
let us wait, in humble trust, till a more mature 
Christian experience on earth, or the light of 
heaven, shall solve the doubt and dispel the 
mystery. 



SERMON XX. 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 

GO HOME TO THY FRIENDS, AND TELL THEM HOW GREAT 
THINGS THE LORD HATH DONE FOR THEE, AND HATH HAD 

COMPASSION ON THEE. — Mark V. 19. 

We lose much of the impression which our 
Saviour's miracles ought to produce upon us, 
when we look at them simply as isolated and 
amazing dispensations of Divine power, aside 
from the common course of human life. Some 
of the most interesting and touching views of 
these miracles are those which we take in con- 
nection with the homes which they made glad, 
with the withered hopes which they revived, 
and the departed joys which they restored. I 
have often dwelt in fancy on the return home 
of the poor demoniac, whose history gives us 
our text this morning. The whole scene paints 
itself with peculiar vividness on my mental ret- 
ina. I may not succeed in transferring it to 
yours ; but if I do, I know that I can in no 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 261 

better way prepare your thoughts for the festi- 
val of redeeming love which mauy of us are to 
celebrate before we part. 

The subject of this miracle has long been a 
victim of the most mysterious and appalling form 
of disease with which God has seen fit to afflict 
his human family. His insanity is not of that 
mitigated type which suffers control, lets in rays 
of sober thought, and remains within reach of 
the endearments and charities of home. He is a 
maniac of the wildest and most fearful stamp. 
He cannot be kept, even in chains, at his own 
dwelling ; but, with the preternatural strength of 
madness, he makes his fetters and handcuffs as 
mere withs of tow. He breaks from all restraint. 
He wears no clothing. His chief abiding-place 
is among the tombs, where, in darkness, amidst 
putrid exhalations and the tokens of loathsome 
decay, he nurses every wild and wayward fancy, 
and revels, like a very fiend, in all that is gloomy 
and terrific. He is reckless even of intense per- 
sonal suffering. In his paroxysms, he rolls him- 
self and lacerates his body upon the sharp rocks, 
and is covered with the scars of self-inflicted 
wounds. He perhaps had been a kind and hap- 
py husband and father ; and now, as he wanders 
among the tombs, a vague remembrance of the 
pleasant home he once had will ever and anon 
dance before his hot brain, and with an unearthly 
laugh and shout he rushes homeward. But liis 



262 THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 

wife, as she sees him approaching, must bar her 
doors against tlie maniac, and liide from his sight 
the children, whom, in a sudden flasli of irre- 
sponsible anger, he may dash against the stones. 
And while he lingers for a moment at the closed 
doors, and prepares to force an entrance, the 
place grows unfamiliar, the recollection of former 
scenes fades away, and the blind instinct of his 
awful malady hurries him back to his dwelling 
among the tombs. Thus has he been for years a 
terror to the whole country round, — so fierce 
and violent, that no man dares pass where he is 
known to be near. He is dead to all worth liv- 
ing for ; his children are fatherless ; his wife, a 
widow. 

There passes near him one morning a little 
company of travellers, who have just crossed the 
lake and are on their way to the neighboring 
city. He rushes from his lurking-place to attack 
them. But, as he approaches them, there is a 
face in the group that arrests the torrent of his 
mad fantasies, and calls back some gleam of con- 
sistency to his chaotic thoughts. That eye has a 
power which he cannot resist. There beam from 
that countenance rays of love, which fall upon 
his darkened soul, and draw him nearer to the 
stranger. It flashes across his memory, that, 
when he dwelt among men, all hoped that the 
Messiah would soon appear. He perhaps had 
been a devout man, waiting for the consolation 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 263 

of Israel ; and, with the rapid reasoning of a 
madman, he says to himself, — " None but the 
Christ of God can wear that face, which both 
awes and attracts me, who for years have 
shunned all and put all to flight." He en- 
ters for a moment into conversation with the 
stranger, and every word betokens a wildly 
disordered intellect. But that eye still rests 
upon him. That face still beams upon him ; 
and there shines through it the same spirit 
which in the inorning of creation brought light 
from darkness, and order out of chaos. It is 
the glory of God in the face of Jesus ; and it 
is pouring ray upon ray on the maniac's soul. 
The clouds part. The gloom is scattered. The 
phantasms of a bewildered brain flit away. The 
lurid flashing of that eye gives place to a look 
of calm intelligence. The tidings spread. The 
people flock from the city. They find him sit- 
ting at the divine Redeemer's feet, clothed, and 
in his right mind. Full of pious gratitude, he 
is unwilling to leave his Saviour. But Jesus 
has not forgotten the maniac's household. He, 
in whom all the families of the earth are blessed, 
lost during his earthly sojourn no opportunity 
of sending comfort and gladness to men's homes. 
*' Go home to thy friends," says he, " and tell 
them how great things the Lord hath done for 
thee, and hath had compassion upon thee." 
His family have not yet heard of the miracle 



264 THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 

of mercy. The father is seen at a distance ap- 
proaching his former dwelling. All is trepida- 
tion and alarm. The doors are barred. The 
mother bids her children conceal themselves 
from their father's sight. But, — "Look," says 
one of them, " he is clothed like any other man." 
" Yes," says another, " and he is walking calmly 
and quietly, not with the rude gestures and hid- 
eous outcries with which he is in the habit of 
coming." " And, mother," says a third, " he 
looks as he did when he lived at home, and we 
used to watch for him, and run out to meet him, 
and strive with each other for his first kiss." 
And the desolate mother sees, with a heart too 
full for utterance, that it is indeed the long lost 
given back, — the dead alive again. As the 
doors are thrown open, and the husband and 
father is clasped in the tearful embrace of those 
who deemed him lost to them for ever, what 
vows of gratitude to God, what blessings on 
the heavenly Teacher, go up from those happy 
hearts, from that restored home ! As the father 
talks to his children of the power and love of the 
Son of God, whose look had healed him, — as 
he recounts every word of the kind Redeemer 
in that touching interview, how fervent must 
have been the thankfulness, how warm the vows 
of consecration, to him whom disease obeyed, 
and who yet (the father tells them) was so 
meek, lowly, and gentle in his aspect, that the 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 265 

youngest child would not fear to approach him ! 
In what sweet peace did that family rest on that 
memorable night ! And, as the Saviour passed 
its sleepless watches on the mountain or the lake, 
think you not that his spirit was with the house- 
hold that he had made so glad, and that his in- 
tercessions went up for them especially, that to 
their outward joy might be added the blessings of 
a living faith and an enduring love ? 

All through our Saviour's weary and homeless 
sojourn, were there not welling up for him sources 
of gladness in families which he had thus blessed, 
in homes which he had thus lighted with unex- 
pected deliverance and joy ? For this is but one 
picture out of many. All along the shores of 
that beautiful lake, and through the whole re- 
gion of Galilee, were dwellings where the heal- 
ing touch of the incarnate love of God had 
rested. Here was the leper, whom he had 
given back from his banishment as a loath- 
some outcast. There was the paralytic, whom 
he had raised from his deathbed. In this fam- 
ily, that lovely maiden, the life and joy of the 
whole household, was made ready for the grave ; 
but he had stood by her lifeless form, and borne 
it from the embrace of death. There, too, was 
that widow, — " the reed on which she leaned 
was broken ; the oil was dried up in her cruse." 
Her only son was carried forth for burial ; but 
the Lord saw her, and had compassion on her, 



266 THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 

and the yonng man awoke at his bidding. Now 
number up the miracles of Jesus that are on 
record, take each of them as the representative 
of a family raised from sadness and desolation 
to joy and overflowing thankfulness ; and you 
may form some faint idea of the amount of mer- 
cy of which he was the immediate source, — of 
the multitudes to whom he was personally en- 
deared as the medium throiigh which they had 
received God's best earthly gifts. You may 
thence learn who composed the crowd of Gali- 
leans that accompanied him with hosannas to 
the temple, — why the cowardly chief priests 
dared not apprehend him publicly while there 
were such multitudes from Galilee in the city, — 
who those people were that smote their breasts 
in agony, when they saw him dead upon the 
cross. 

These miracles, apart from their worth as cre- 
dentials of our Lord's Divine commission, are of 
infinite value from their compassionate character. 
They are all of them works of signal mercy. 
They unfold to us a love unwearied and. inex- 
haustible, — a compassion that can let no suffer- 
ing go unrelieved. They reveal to us the High- 
Priest who is touched with the feeling of our in- 
firmities, — who bears the griefs and carries the 
sorrows of his brethren upon earth. They give 
us an implicit trust in the surviving sympathy 
and love of our ascended Redeemer. They bring 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 267 

him near us in every season of trial or sorrow. 
And, by looking through the Son to the Father 
whose image he bore, we are brought by these 
miracles into face-to-face communion with God. 
His glory and his goodness pass before us. From 
the demoniac's dwelling, from the gate of Nain, 
from the tomb of Bethany, there come to us as- 
surances, which admit not of being made strong- 
er, that God is love. When clouds and darkness 
are about him, we can go back to that year of his 
right hand, and learn that mercy is the founda- 
tion of his throne. 

These miracles are of peculiar value as reveal- 
ing the providence of God. Had what we call 
the order of nature never been broken, we might 
have imagined it something real and constraining. 
We might have looked upon the universe as a 
vast piece of mechanism, rolled on in its revolu- 
tions with no reference to human weal or woe. 
We should have yearned for miracles to show us 
that the world was not governed by chance, or 
fate, or combinations of brute matter. But now 
the wonderful works of Jesus have laid bare the 
springs of nature, and uncovered her foundations. 
Its mechanism, though perfect, is seen to be not 
absolute. Its laws bend to man's necessities. 
The wheels are indeed there ; but, as in Ezekiel's 
vision, there is a living spirit in the wheels, and 
whithersoever the spirit goes, there the wheels go. 
We thus learn that the established order of events 



268 THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 

is a means, not an end, — yaried in former times 
for the welfare of the spiritual universe, and 
therefore in itself flexible, subservient to spiritual 
laws and uses, and ordained for the nurture and 
progress of the souls subjected to its discipline. 
The same hand, that through Jesus visibly arrest- 
ed the common course of events, must still gov- 
ern and modify that course by the invisible shap- 
ing of remoter causes. Miracles at any one time 
imply a discretionary providence at all times, and 
thus they come to our hearts with an unspeak- 
able power of consolation in our seasons of deep- 
est gloom and greatest need. The sick have 
been raised by a word from the couch of hope- 
less suffering ; a look has restored the maniac 
to perfect soundness ; the dead have heard the 
voice of the Son of Man, and come forth. These 
darker ways of Providence are then dark no 
longer. There is for us, no less than there was 
for the men of Galilee, a power mightier than 
disease, — a love stronger than death. The arm 
that then raised the sick and dying, still mighty 
to save, is laid beneath every sufferer. He who 
bore back the prey from the grave watches the 
sleeping dust, and receives the ascending spirit. 
I have spoken of the gladness sent to so many 
homes and hearts by the miracles of Jesus. Has 
he ceased to exert this benign agency ? Or have 
outward miracles, having discharged their min- 
istry, yielded place to still "greater works"? 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 269 

Would you answer this question, go with me to 
the dwelling of as happy a family as you may find 
among a thousand. On the lips of the parents is 
the law of love ; tenderness and reverence are 
hlended in every look and tone of the children. 
An unkind word is never heard, a morose counte- 
nance never seen there. The father daily stands 
as priest at his own household altar, and his over- 
flowing gratitude hardly leaves room for supplica- 
tion. On the Lord's day, they go up to the sanc- 
tuary together, and not one of them retires when 
the table of redeeming love is spread. Their 
whole lives adorn the doctrine of their Saviour ; 
and their home is a radiating place for pious ex- 
ample and holy influence. But go back a few 
years, and what was that family ? The father a 
self-made maniac, — the slave of brutal appetite. 
His chief haunt was where they dig graves for 
men's souls ; and when he came to his own house, 
it was but to curse his family, and to make his 
home a hell. The children were growing up in 
ignorance, waywardness, and squalidness, prom- 
ising only to add to the mass of pauperism and 
crime. The mother alone trusted in Ood ; and 
her heart would long ago have broken, had she 
not looked for a rest where the wicked cease from 
troubling. But the divine Redeemer visited that 
family. The mother's prayers were at length 
heard. The father's heart was touched. The 
Lord looked upon him, and he wept. His tears 

23* 



270 THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 

flowed from a repentance not to be repented of. 
His Saviour's face shone in upon his darkened 
and perverted soul, and left its image there. 
And then father and mother together bore their 
children to the Redeemer for his blessing, and in 
united prayer and effort consecrated them to his 
altar and his kingdom. He has accepted the of- 
fering, and set his seal on all their hearts. Nor 
is this a scene by itself. Such are the blessings 
which Jesus has shed and is shedding abroad in 
thousands of families all over Christendom. Such 
are the fountains of compassion that still flow 
from him whose love we this morning conunemi- 
orate. There this day meet in his temple and 
surround his altar multitudes whom he has ran- 
somed from the lowest degradation and the foul- 
est guilt, cleansed from the most loathsome lep- 
rosy, and brought from the most Grod-defying 
madness, to sit at his feet, clothed and in their 
right mind. 

But while we contemplate with adoring love 
the miracles which Jesus wrought in the days 
of his flesh, and the blessing which he now dis- 
penses over the wide world from his mediatorial 
throne, shall we not prepare for our approaching 
altar-service ascriptions of gratitude for the great 
things that he has done for us, and for the com- 
passion that he has had upon us individually ? 
With what portion of our well-being and happi- 
ness is not his image blended? What is there 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 271 

that renders our life here blessed, or that lights 
up the future with promise, which he has not 
either bestowed, or made more precious and avail- 
ing ? Do we behold with a safe and glad feeling 
the majesty and beauty of the outward creation, 
and joyfully listen to the anthem of universal na- 
ture, as, like the voice of many waters, her blend- 
ed tones rise in praise and gratitude to her Au- 
thor ? Jesus has opened our eyes to the beauty, 
our ears to the harmony, of creation. To him do 
we owe it, that we see not wrath in the storm- 
cloud and meet not the glance of a malignant 
deity in the lightning's flash. To him do we owe 
it, that we are not dwelling as orphans in a world 
without a God. Are we bound by close and 
happy ties of kindred and family ? To him do 
we owe tile permanence, purity, and sacredness 
of these relations, — to him those domestic virtues 
which are the defence and joy of our households, 
— to him the affections, which we call natural, 
but which flow from the new consecration that 
he has given to the family union. Do we think 
of departed members of our circle as not lost, 
but gone before, — as treasures laid up for us in 
heaven, — as friends, with whom we shall take 
sweet counsel and walk in unbroken communion 
through unknown ages ? It is Jesus that sealed 
these hopes for us, wlien his voice broke the slum- 
ber of the grave, and when he himself, having 
tasted death for every man, walked again among 



272 THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 

the living. Have we the consciousness of Divine 
pardon, and, with all our unworthiness, can we 
welcome the thought of our Father's presence ? 
It is because we have heard the voice and trusted 
in the reconciling blood of him who alone had 
power upon earth to forgive sin. Have we prin- 
ciples of duty, with which we have withstood, 
and hope still to withstand, the assult of fierce 
temptation, — principles which we can obey with 
ioy, and which their trial only makes the dearer 
to us ? They have come to us from the Mount 
of the Beatitudes, and from the lips of the Man 
of Sorrows. They have been fastened upon our 
souls by his example, — sealed for our salvation 
by his death. If there be in us any virtue or 
any praise, we owe it to him who trod before us 
the path of duty, and with his own bleeding feet 
wore its rough places smooth, — who has made 
goodness amiable by his own loveliness, piety at- 
tractive by his own winning spirit, heaven in- 
viting by the thought that he is there. Do we 
look forward into eternity without fear, and think 
of the grave as but the portal to a more ample, 
glorious, and happy sphere of being ? It is Je- 
sus that has taken for us the sting from death, 
and the terror from the grave. His mercies, like 
his Father's, beset us behind and before, — com- 
pass our path and our lying down. There is not 
a bright scene of life that is not lighted by his 
smile, — not a pure jo/ thai^ i«i notkipdle^^ bj his 
breath. 



THE GADARENE DEMONIAC. 273 

I say not these things to heap unmeaning 
praises upon the Redeemer's head. The more I 
meditate on all of blessing and of hope that is 
given us upon earth, the more do I feel that hu- 
man life is but an extended commentary on our 
Saviour's words, " I and the Father are one, " — 
that the Father and the Son work together in all 
that gladdens this life, and in all that fits us for 
a higher and better home ; so that he, who by 
his own negligence or guilt '* hath not the Son, 
hath not the Father." I feel that no department 
of the Father's goodness is complete, till rays 
from Tabor and from Calvary have rested upon 
it, — that no cup which the Father designs for us 
is mingled as he would have it, till Jesus has 
poured into it those waters of which he that 
drinketh shall thirst no more. Let us, then, ap- 
proach the holy table with the liveliest gratitude 
to him whom God hath ordained to be our Prince 
and our Saviour ; and may he so become known 
to us in the breaking of bread, that we may fer- 
vently renew and never more violate that fellow- 
ship with him, which is our peace on earth, and 
our eternal life in heaven. 



SERMON XXI. 



BEAUTY. 

HE HATH MADE EVERYTHING BEAUTIFUL IN HIS TIME. — • 

Ecclesiastes iii. 11. 

How rich are tlie traits and manifestations of 
man's creative genius ! Think of the vast num- 
ber and diversity of gorgeous and attractive forms, 
with which descriptive and imaginative talent has 
enriched the literature of all ages. One might 
revel in the works of genius for a whole millen- 
nium, and still its transmitted treasures would 
be unexhausted. And the fruits of mental toil, 
in all times, from the rude lyric of the savage to 
the rounded and polished productions of the most 
advanced culture, how redolent of beauty, — 
how thickly studded with gems of the purest lus- 
tre and transcending magnificence ! Yet new 
sources of inspiration are still continually open- 
ing, and for thousands of years to come original 
genius will find fields not preoccupied, so that the 
stimulus of novelty will stir and reward the liter- 



BEAUTY. 275 

ary artificer to the end, no less than in the infan- 
cy, of time. Art, too, how endlessly varied in its 
embodiments of all that is fair, and grand, and 
glorious ! Even the same simple theme, like the 
Madonna, may pass down from generation to gen- 
eration, and every new pencil may make the 
theme its own by some added or varied line of 
beauty, some new shading or mellowing of the 
features, some bolder stroke or softer touch. 
How numberless, also, are the combinations of 
blended or interchanging majesty and beauty 
which rise and are yet to rise in the simple and 
the complex, the lowly and the lofty forms of 
architecture, — in column, tower, and dome, — in 
cottage, temple, and cathedral ! Who can say to 
the creative spirit of man, " Thus far slialt thou 
go, and no farther " ? Who does not feel that 
human capacity, in whatever form it may seek 
to embody its conceptions, is absolutely limitless 
and inexhaustible ? 

But whence this power in man? What are 
his creations but copies of the thoughts of God ? 
That they are nothing else is implied in the fun- 
damental canons of literature, art, and taste. 
Truth to nature is the sole test of beauty. That 
which has no counterpart in God's actual world 
has no honor in man's ideal world. That which 
departs from the plan of the Supreme Architect 
does violence to human taste, and is rejected as 
monstrous and repulsive. Man, the creator as he 



276 BEAUTY. 

vainly styles himself, is but the copyist ; and it is 
because nature is infinite in its varieties and com- 
binations of beauty, that we feel that genius has 
no limit, and can never have fully uttered and 
embodied itself. There is always more to delight 
the eye and ear in the works of God, than man 
has ever recorded, sung, or pencilled. More of 
beauty has been over, around, and beneath us, on 
our walks to the sanctuary this day, than it ever 
entered or will enter the heart of man to con- 
ceive. The glad heavens, the rejoicing earth, — 
the numberless forms of life that burst into being 
with each summer morning, — the light that glim- 
mers from dcwdrops, glows in flowers, in gaudier 
or chaster radiance shines from the vast complex- 
ity, the sublime unity of nature, — the rolling 
around and up of gleams of glory from all crea- 
tion, — the smile of God reflected from all be- 
neath and all above, — does it not infinitely tran- 
scend all power of thought or imagining, and 
make us feel that the combined intellect of hu- 
manity for centuries of centuries could write out 
but here and tliere a single leaf of the immeasur- 
able volume, which bears the Creator's imprint ? 
Do we admire the partial copies that man has 
made ? Do we bow down to the genius that can 
see and hear a little portion of the Divine idea ? 
Shall not, then, our thoughts go up with unspeak- 
ably loftier reverence and more fervent adoration 
to Him who " has made everything beautiful " ? 



BEAUTY. 277 

Reflect for a moment on beauty as an attribute 
of the Supreme Intelligence. Reflect on God as 
the Originator of all that delights the eye and 
charms the fancy. Wliat an inconceivable wealth 
of beauty must reside in the mind, which, with- 
out a copy, first called forth these numberless 
hues and shades that relieve each other and melt 
into each other in the vast whole of nature, — 
which devised these countless forms of vegetable 
life, from the way-side flower that blooms to-day 
and withers to-morrow, to the forest giant that 
outlasts the rise and fall of nations and of em- 
pires, — which meted out the heavens, measured 
the courses and arranged the harmonies of the 
stars, spread the ocean, poured the river, torrent, 
and waterfall ! What an infinity of resources 
do we behold in the alternate phases of the out- 
ward universe, each of which seems too beautiful 
to be replaced by one of equal loveliness, and yet 
yields at once its fancied pre-eminence to its suc- 
cessor ! Thus, who can say which is the more 
replete with beauty, day with its all-revealing 
light, or night with its countless centres of faint- 
er radiance ; — spring, with its outgushing from 
every fountain of life, its promise half hidden, 
half disclosed, its fresh, thin field and forest drap- 
ery ; summer, with its richer, deeper verdure, its 
gayer forms, and more festive aspect ; autumn, 
with its harvest wealth, its party-colored foliage, 
and its piles of gold and crimson in the'west- 

24 



278 BEAUTY. 

ern sky ; or hoary winter, in its simpler, purer 
robe, with its delicate frostwork and its icy sta- 
lactites ? Go where you will, you escape not the 
reign of beauty. During the long polar night, 
tlie northern fires bathe heaven and earth in 
splendor more gorgeous than day. The torrid 
sand-waste still lies beneath a glorious sky, and 
is studded with oases rich in all the tokens of 
creative love. Wreaths and fillets of azure mist 
belt the bare mountain crags, while about their 
summits the 

" Signs and wonders of the element 
Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise." 

Even in mid-ocean, the phosphorescent fires by 
night, the dance and swell of majestic billows, 
the gorgeous clouds that float or rest over the 
surface of the deep, the leap, flight, and play 
of numberless forms of life above and beneath, 
sustain the unwearied interest of him who views 
the works of God with open eye, and bear con- 
current testimony with the voice of holy writ, 
that " He hath made everything beautiful." 

Now do not these manifestations of beauty 
throughout the visible universe reveal a corre- 
sponding attribute of the Almighty, — an at- 
tribute for which technical theology perhaps has 
no name, but the true heart can coin one ? It 
is more than power, and more than wisdom ; 
for these perfections of the Deity would have 
found an adequate expression in the vast pro- 



BEAUTY. 279 

portions of the faultless harmony of creation. 
It is something else than love, which might 
have wrought its - ends by means less diversi- 
fied, and in a less attractive universe. It is 
something which bears the same relation to 
taste in man, which giving bears to receiving, 
devising to enjoying, or artistical invention to 
susceptibility. Its source in the Divine mind 
must be the human idea of beauty refined, ex- 
alted, carried out into infinity. 

The depths of the Divine Intelligence we in- 
deed cannot fathom ; but there are some views of 
practical interest to be derived from the thoughts 
which I have very imperfectly expressed, yet 
which have, I trust, awakened in your minds a 
fuller echo of your own experience than has 
fallen upon your ears. 

First, tliey suggest one mode of worship, which 
must always make us better, — that of the de- 
vout contemplation of the visible works of God. 
I apprehend that, while almost all enjoy change 
of place, the exhilaration of travelling, and the 
rest and recreation which free air and pleasant 
scenes bring with them, the chief associations 
connected, even in serious minds, with scenery 
of peculiar magnificence are too often those of 
amusement rather than devotion, and that the 
thoughts are prone to rest on the society and 
the casual sources of enjoyment in the prox- 
imity of mountain, cataract, or ocean, ratlier 



280 BEAUTY. 

than on tlie salient features of the Creator's 
handiwork. I deem it a duty for all who can 
to cultivate conversance witli these scenes, not 
for recreation alone, but for the sake of the 
heart and the character. It enlarges and ex- 
pands the affections, it ennobles the moral na- 
ture, it imparts new tenderness and refinement 
to the whole inner man, thus to commune 
with God in his own forms of beauty, thug 
to enter more fully into his tlioughts as they 
are embodied by himself, unmarred by human 
agency. 

But let me not be understood to imply, that 
close and high communion with God in nature 
is a luxury reserved for wealth or leisure. The 
beauty which we would seek lies at every man's 
door. Oar heavens, our fields, our gardens, are 
full of it. Only the eye, the heart, is wanting ; 
and he who cannot enjoy such scenes as have 
met his eye this very day may range the world 
over, and names, prices, and statistics will be all 
that his mind will gather up and bring home. 
The clover-blossom, the midday or the evening 
cloud, the morning red, the glistening dew, the 
sparrow's flight, or the swallow's nest, may bring 
the Creator as near, — may suffuse the heart as 
richly with the divine spirit of beauty, — may 
prepare it to enjoy in a future life its range 
from world to world, as now from thought to 
thought, as surely and as effectually, — as those 



BEAUTY. 281 

scenes where only the favored few can go to 
worship. With regard to nature it has been 
said, (and, it seems to me, with literal truth,) 
" To enjoy is to adore." There can be no full 
and true enjoyment of nature, except by those 
who see the hand and hear the voice of the 
Eternal in his works. I never heard of an 
atheist's enjoying the outward universe, nor do 
I believe it possible. The soul that begins to 
perceive the beauty of the creation yearns for 
communion in its solitude, for the living spirit 
in its stillness. To enter into the heart of na- 
ture is to talk face to face with its Author. 

The thoughts which I have suggested lend, 
also, a motive to our conversance with the mon- 
uments of human art, taste, and genius. As we 
resort to sages raised up and inspired by God 
for the interpretation of religious truth, so may 
we fittingly look to those whose eyes and ears 
he has made peculiarly sensitive to the beauty 
and harmony of nature for the interpretation 
of her laws and mysteries, for conceptions often 
truer than our own, for transcripts more faith- 
ful than our duller inward vision can take for 
itself. The genuine poet or artist stands be- 
tween us and God's world of beauty, in the 
same relation in which the seer or the evan- 
gelist stands between us and his realm of truth. 
The former has from him a mission to the imagi- 
nation, as truly as the latter to the judgment or 

24* 



282 BEAUTY. 

the will. The latter, indeed, occupies the most 
important place ; for matters of faith and duty 
are concerns of life or death to the soul. Yet 
the former may impart aid of inestimable value 
to the mission of the latter ; for truth and beauty 
are in sacred harmony, and the mind possessed 
by the spirit of beauty can the more readily per- 
ceive the proportions, relations, and evidences of 
truth, — the soul in which the beauty of crea- 
tion finds a ready response, being at that point 
in communion with the Divine mind, can the 
more easily and cordially enter into that spirit- 
ual oneness with God, which is the perfection 
of character. But most of all does the devout 
mind love to commune with truth and beauty 
in those forms of literature, in which they have 
been blended by Divine inspiration. It finds no 
poetry so sublime as that of psalmist, prophet, 
and apostle, — that which connects the image 
of the heavenly Shepherd with the green pas- 
tures and still waters, draws lessons of a pater- 
nal Providence from the courses of Orion and 
Arcturus, names for the rain and for the drops 
of dew their Father, and resorts to every king- 
dom of nature, and gathers in materials from 
every portion of the visible universe, to portray 
the New Jerusalem, the golden city of our God, 
the gates within which the sun goes not down, 
for " the glory of God doth lighten it, and the 
Lamb is the light thereof." 



BEAUTY. 283 

Again, beauty, though distinct from love, is 
the minister of love. Tliough, without creating 
it in nature, or making man susceptible of its 
influences, God might have been good and our 
Father, it immeasurably enhances our sense of 
his goodness, and renders him much more our 
Father. Its every ray is edged and fringed 
with mercy. Its every form bears the inscrip- 
tion, " God is love." When it beams upon 
lis from the heavens, it reveals his benignity. 
When it glows on the earth, or gleams from the 
ocean, it reflects his smile. When it stretches 
its many-colored bow on the cloud or the water- 
fall, it utters his thoughts of peace. Who can 
watch the course of one of these bright summer 
days, from the song that ushers in the gray, 
misty dawn, till twilight broods and the stars 
come out over slumbering nature, without feel- 
ing that eyes of God are all around him, — 
that the Divine presence is, on every hand, re- 
flected into his soul from field and sky, from 
cloud and star? 

Have not all these scenes a voice of tender 
sympathy and consolation for the grief-stricken ? 
Was it not for this, that our Saviour directed the 
anxious and desponding to the fields in blossom, 
and the rejoicing birds, and said, " If your Fa- 
ther thus feed and clothe them, shall he not 
much more care for you ? " In a world thus 
full of beauty, thus suffused by the smile of the 



284 BEAUTY. 

Universal Father, there can be no sorrow sent 
as sorrow. It can be only those whom God 
loves that he chastens. The griefs that flow at 
his bidding, severe and desolating as they seem, 
can be to the soul only what dreary vernal rains 
are to the upspringing grass and the unfolding 
blossoms, — what the cloud big with thunder is 
to the sultry atmosphere of summer. Not to 
blight the harvest of human hope and joy, but 
to bring forth in fresh luxuriance every plant 
of our Heavenly Father's planting, do the rains 
descend and the floods come upon the afflicted 
heart. Not to destroy or hopelessly bow down 
the soul, but to dispel the suffocating mist of 
worldliness, to open a clearer, higher range of 
"\dsion for the inward eye, to make the upper 
heavens look serene and beautiful, falls the bolt 
that sends alarm and agony to our homes and 
hearts. Let us, then, in our sorrows, welcome 
the revelation of Divine love, with which the 
heavens are dropping and the earth teeming, 
which day utters to day and night rehearses to 
night. It is because new heavens and a new 
earth are made ready for us, that we must some- 
times suffer here. It is because our affections 
and hopes should be elsewhere, that change, 
blight, and death must pass upon their dearest 
objects. It is to train the earthly vine about the 
tree of eternal life, that the heavenly husband- 
man cuts its lower tendrils, so that it may cling 



BEAUTY. . 285 

ever closer, and climb ever higher, till in his own 
good time he unearths its root, and transplants 
it to 

" Those everlasting gardens. 
Where angels walk, and seraphs are the wardens, 
Where every flower brought safe through death's dark portal ' 
Becomes immortal." 



SERMON XXII. 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 

LOKD, IP THOTJ HADST BEEN HERE, MY BROTHER HAD NOT 

DIED. — John xi. 21. 

It was with these words that the two sisters of 
Lazarus successively accosted our Saviour, when 
he visited them four days after their brother's 
death. And they said the truth. Many liad 
been the dying whom his touch, his word, had 
given back to life ; and, had he stood by the bed- 
side of his expiring friend, the tomb would liave 
remained unopened. But he had purposely 
brought about the contingency named by the sis- 
ters. He knew that Lazarus was ill, and for that 
very reason lingered on his way to Bethany, — 
waited for him to die. Yet Lazarus and his sis- 
ters were the objects of Christ's peculiar love ; 
and his strong sympathy with their distress and 
dread would have prompted him to walk day and 
night that he might avert the fatal stroke. But 
it was essential for the higher ends of the Divine 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 287 

administration, essential for the religious nurture 
and elevation of that very family, that Lazarus 
should die. And when, with their restored broth- 
er, they had too a more li\diig faith, a more fer- 
vent hope of immortality, a richer experience of 
the power and love of Christ, than they had 
ever imagined before, they undoubtedly thanked 
God that Lazarus had been left to die. 

There is a very close analogy between the state 
of feeling expressed in our text, and that experi- 
enced by the greater part of the bereaved in our 
own day. If is the emphatic word in the com- 
plaint of the sisters. " If thou hadst been here, 
my brother had not died." How few bereave- 
ments there are, which are not made doubly af- 
flictive by an i/, — by a past contingency, which, 
had it occurred, would have turned aside the 
sword of the death-angel ! If our friend had not 
incurred this or that exposure, — if he had done 
this instead of doing that, — if we had been early 
enough alarmed on his account, — if we had fore- 
seen such and such results from what was well 
considered and rightly meant, — a life so much 
valued and desired would have been spared. 
Many of you can bear me witness, that such 
thoughts have arisen in your minds during sea- 
sons of sorrow ; and with some of you I know 
that they have occasioned absolute agony of spir- 
it, and formed the most bitter ingredient in the 
cup of affliction. So long as these thoughts are 



288 CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROYIDENCE. 

present, perfect resignation is impossible. They 
come in between you and God, prevent your 
minds from resting on him as the sole author 
of the afflictive event, and bewilder you in that 
endless maze of second causes, which no mortal 
can thread, and in which no soul of man ever 
found repose. I feel, therefore, that I shall con- 
fer a lasting benefit on many of you, as regards 
both past and future griefs, if I can suppress that 
if^ discourage your uneasy reflections on what 
might have been, and lead your minds up to 
Him, whose wise and kind purpose remains un- 
affected by these contingencies that give us so 
much pain. 

Let me first remind you, that, if there is room 
for these painful reflections in any one case, there 
is equally room for them in almost every case. 
Take any instance of death, except by constitu- 
tional decay, trace back the last hours, days, 
weeks, or months of the departed, and you can 
always fix upon some circumstance which seemed 
the turning-point of his destiny, and of which you 
can say, " Only let that have been otherwise, he 
would have been still living." Only let danger 
be foreseen, and, humanly speaking, in nine cases 
out of ten death would be prevented. Thus, was 
toil or fatigue the reputed cause of fatal disease ? 
It may, indeed, have been no more than others 
incur, or than the deceased himself has often in- 
curred with impunity. Yet, with death visibly 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 289 

impending, he would have suspended the peril- 
ous labor, have left the wearisome task undone. 
Or has our friend fallen the victim of infectious 
or epidemic illness ? Had he been aware of his 
peculiar peril, he would have passed beyond the 
infected region. Or would earlier medical treat- 
ment have f^xrested the disorder? Could its se- 
verity have been foreknown, those earlier meas- 
ures would not have been deemed superfluous. 
Or has our friend perished by what we most ir- 
religiously term accident ? Had the fatal con- 
juncture of circumstances only cast its shadow 
before, he would have taken warning and es- 
caped. Did we see early enough the train of 
second causes which issues in death, hardly any 
but the very aged would die. Nor is it death 
alone which we should tlius avert. Calamities 
and misfortunes of every class flow immediately 
from the shortness of human foresight. Did we 
know of the impending conflagration, its first kin- 
dling might be smothered by the hand. Could 
the ocean storms be calculated, and the shifting 
currents of the sea be mapped for every voyage, 
there would be no shipwrecks. Did we fore- 
know, in almost every case we could provide. 
In fact, it is chiefly in this short-sightedness that 
human weakness consists. It is at this very point 
that the Divine Providence overrules man's coun- 
sels, executes those thoughts, and moves in those 
ways, that are liigher than ours. When, there- 

25 



290 CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 

fore, you say, " Had it been thus or so, my hus- 
band, my brother, my child, had not died," your 
complaint in reality concerns, not the circum- 
stances of that one case, but the ordinance of 
Divine wisdom, by which man is kept in so great 
a degree ignorant of the future. 

Let me next remind you that this principle ap- 
plies not merely to the calamitous, but equally to 
the happy, portions of our earthly experience. 
Recovery, preservation, prosperity, wealth, single 
instances ©r occasions of success or high enjoy- 
ment, depend equally on contingencies, which, 
when we look back, we see might have been 
far otherwise. Two courses are before you, my 
friend, and the motives for taking them are even- 
ly balanced. You make your choice, and are led 
on step by step to success or happiness. You 
retrace the series of causes, and find that the 
prosperous event flowed from that first choice. 
You can now also trace the results of the other 
alternative which you almost chose, and can see 
that it would have been utterly disastrous. Yet 
your choice was determined, not by foresight of 
the end, but seemingly by the most casual cir- 
cumstances. Thus there is room for the per- 
petually recurring if in our joys which we can- 
not number, no less than in our sorrows which 
we can count. The doubt which rests on our 
decisions is big with more hope than fear, brings 
in its train more gladness than grief. 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 291 

Now, with reference to afflictive events, the 
great mistake to which we are prone consists in 
imagining that it was in our power to foreknow 
all that events in their progress make known to 
lis. The child of a watchful and experienced 
mother is taken away by acute disease. The 
attack was sudden ; yet the seeds of the dis- 
order must have been lurking in the system for 
days or weeks previously, and there were pre- 
ventive measures by which the danger might 
have been warded off. The mother's memory, 
sharpened by her grief, can now recall symptoms 
that might have indicated disease, — a drooping 
of the eyelids, or a flush of the cheek, or an 
unusual drowsiness, wakefulness, or peevishness ; 
and, in remembrance of these unheeded indica- 
tions, her sorrow is drugged with intense bitter- 
ness, as she reproaches herself that she had not 
taken alarm at the tokens of incipient illness, 
and administered such remedies as might then 
have proved effectual. I would say to that moth- 
er, — "These symptoms, my friend, needed the 
event to interpret them. They have occured 
thousands of times when they denoted nothing 
fatal. They were such that even science and 
skill could have drawn no certain conclusions 
from them. They were so slight and indefinite, 
that they would not have justified fear, or war- 
ranted your resort to special means of relief. 
Providence did not see fit to reveal to you your 



292 CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCEr 

child's peril, till death was at the door ; and you 
have no more ground for painful reflection and 
self-reproach, than if the child had been slain by 
a thunderbolt from a cloudless sky." In un- 
numbered instances, the event reveals to us facts 
that existed long prior to the event, but which 
in the nature of things it was impossible for us 
to know ; and, where knowledge could not be, 
there can have been no responsibility. No mat- 
ter what light we subsequently gain as to the 
past, — while Providence withheld that light, 
there was nothing for us to do, and there can 
be no ground on which we should cast censure 
upon ourselves. 

These remarks indicate the point on which 
we chiefly need to practise Christian submis- 
sion, namely, as to the necessary limits of hu- 
man foresight. We need to be resigned to our 
ignorance of coming events, and to our conse- 
quent inability to avert them. This ignorance 
is a part of the Divine plan ; and we can hardly 
conceive how essentially it ministers to our hap- 
piness. A single calamitous event occurs, my 
friend, to you or your household, and you half 
murmur that you could not have discerned its 
approach in season to prevent it. Suppose that 
you were endowed with keen foresight as to all 
the possibilities and remoter causes of disease and 
calamity for yourself and your family, — think 
you that there would be a moment when some 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 293 

such possibility would not be present ? Would 
not incessant, anxious watchfulness paralyze your 
power of enjoyment, fill the day with weariness, 
and drive sleep from your pillow by night ? Such 
knowledge would make you a sort of secondary 
providence in your own circle, and would im- 
pose upon you a weight of care and supervision 
such as no being less than the Omnipotent could 
sustain. Could you lead such a life for a single 
day, you would pray to drop it before nightfall. 
Except as God keeps us, we are in incessant 
peril. We all constantly pass through hidden 
danger, and the death-angel daily brushes our 
skirts. We never lie down to our rest, or leave 
our beds, without owing our life for another day 
or night, humanly speaking, to a multitude of 
contingent events, which might all have hap- 
pened otherwise, and which Providence has ad- 
justed for us, but each of which in prospect 
would have given us the most intense anxiety. 
We should suffer more in a single day from a 
clear ^dew of all that we and our friends are 
liable to encounter, than from all the bereave- 
ments and sorrows that the most afflicted of us 
have been called to bear. Blessed be God that we 
know not what a day may bring forth ! When he 
mingles for us the cup of grief, it overflows with 
consolation and with hope. Could we snatch it 
from his hand before he has prepared it for us, we 
should drink only a potion of dread and agony. 

25* 



294 CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 

In fine, we may sum up the condition of our 
mortal life in this wise. There are two systems 
at work together in human affairs. The one is 
that of man's duty ; the other, that of God's 
Providence. There is a world of practical wis- 
dom in the adage so old and trite, — "Duty is 
ours, events are God's." In the hour of be- 
reavement, the question as to our fidelity to 
duty in the relation now suspended will come 
up, and ought to come up. Have I been faith- 
ful to the temporal, the spiritual interests of 
the friend taken from me ? Have I been un- 
selfish, even-tempered, frank, sincere, munificent 
to the full measure of his rights and my ability ? 
Have I habitually acted towards him as my cer- 
tain knowledge or my best judgment dictated ? 
With regard to the apparent causes of his re- 
moval, have I been innocent of wanton careless- 
ness, so that I have neither done nor sanctioned 
what was in itself injudicious or inconsiderate, — - 
what would liave been so, even if no untoward 
consequences had flowed from it ? When you 
can answer these questions to your satisfaction, 
you have no ground for uneasiness. You did 
what you could. You had not Divine foresight. 
Much which you know now was indeed hidden 
from you ; and, had you known it earlier, you 
would have done differently. But God meant 
that you should not know it. He had higher 
purposes of his own to serve by your ignorance. 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 295 

Had he seen fit to spare your friend, he would 
have indicated the danger in season for you to 
ward it off, or the certain remedy in season for 
you to apply it. Do not, then, harass and tor- 
ment yourself, because you were not in God's 
stead, — because you were a short-sighted mortal 
as to events so nearly affecting your peace and 
happiness. 

Such is the system of human duty. Do your 
duty ; and in the vast majority of instances it 
will lead to" the outward results that you desire. 
Obey the laws of your physical nature, and health 
will be the rule, disease the exception. Use wise 
precautions in seasons of peculiar peril ; and the 
shaft that smites down the unwary will, in most 
cases, fall harmless at your feet. Be assiduous, 
watchful, and judicious in the care of your chil- 
dren ; and, in most of your households, death will 
be infrequent. Above all, do your duty to your- 
selves, to one another, to your children, as im- 
mortals, fellow-pilgrims on earth, fellow-candi- 
dates for heaven ; and, however numerous may 
be the partings by the way, they will be relieved 
by the hope of immortality, and you shall all 
meet again where you will never say farewell. 

But with all your care, watchfulness, and fidel- 
ity, there is yet another system, that of Divine 
Providence, which has no law but the eternal 
love of God. His decree has gone forth, "In 
the world ye shall have tribulation." For wise 



296 CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 

reasons, which are in part revealed to us now, 
and which we may fully know hereafter, he sees 
fit to discipline us by disease, calamity, and be- 
reavement. We need this discipline as sinners, 
to bring us to repentance. We need it as as- 
pirants for goodness, to make our aims more 
steadfast, our desires purer, our faith stronger, 
our trust firmer. We need it as pilgrims here 
and citizens of a better country, to detach us 
from the attractions by the way-side, and to fix 
our thoughts and affections on things above. 
When God sees that we need this discipline, 
vain is our care and skill, vain our anxious 
thoughts, our wisest precautions. Disease at 
his bidding will seize the most robust frame, 
and elude the most wakeful prudence. Calami- 
ty will thwart our best-laid plans, and disappoint 
our best-founded hopes. Death will enter the 
fold the most carefully fenced, will take the child 
the most vigilantly guarded, the youth whose life 
and health are the parent's chief solicitude, the 
maiden on whom no rough blast from without 
has ever breathed. In these mysterious events, 
the experience of ever^ year and month proves 
over and over again that ^' the race is not to 
the swift, nor the battle to the strong ; neither 
yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of 
understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill." 
All that remains for us is to bow in trustful sub- 
mission, and to say, " It is the Lord, — let him 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 297 

do what seemeth to him good." These afflic- 
tions are in no sense of our own procuring, nor 
should they be rendered one whit more sad by 
the momentary thought that we could have pre- 
vented them. They are a burden beyond our 
strength ; and we should give heed to the exhor- 
tation, " Cast thy burden upon the Lord." 

Among the most mysterious and appalling 
events that occur under the Divine government 
is the death of those who are called away in 
opening life, and with endowments of mind and 
character which give the best promise of useful- 
ness and happiness in this world.* Yet how es- 
sential it is that the young should sometimes die ! 
Were any age or condition exempt from the fre- 
quent visitings of death, it would be divorced to 
a lamentable degree from the sense of accounta- 
bility, and would be made almost accursed be- 
cause the powers of the world to come no longer 
rested upon it. Unutterably sad is the death, 
the burial-scene, of the young wife and mother. 
But by means of the one that dies, may not 
a multitude of. the living be kept near heaven 
vrhile surrounded with earthly joy and hope, led 
to " use the world as not abusing it," and to 
make duty the supreme end of life ? Yes. The 
shadow of death sanctifies hundreds of young 
homes which the death-angel may not enter for 

* This and the following paragraph were "WTitten with reference 
to individual instances of death then recent. 



298 CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 

many years, shields the guardians of their peace 
and purity from youthful giddiness and frivolity, 
and sustains them in patient, cheerful duty by 
the consciousness that, in an hour when they 
think not, the Son of Man may come. And who 
need the admonishing voice from early graves, 
as do the young men of this busy, distracting, 
tempted generation ? They are hard by the quick- 
sands on which thousands make shipwreck. For 
them the pestilence walks in darkness. Among 
them destruction wastes at noonday. Appetite 
allures them. If they escape it, gain holds out 
its gilded bait. Evil examples beset them. Sin, 
its deformity covered up by its stolen mask of 
joy, encounters them at every street's turn. 
Gates of spiritual death open at almost every 
step of their way. Gulfs of perdition yawn for 
them beneath almost every footfall. Well is it 
for them that the grave should sometimes open 
near them, eternity utter its voices, and the cry 
come from the death-bed of those as young and 
as sanguine as themselves, " Prepare to meet 
your God. — Know ye that for all these things 
God will bring you into judgment." 

With this most essential ministry to the living, 
there are many aspects in which the death of 
the young may seem a peculiarly merciful ap- 
pointment. How often do we witness the early 
removal of those, whose tender sensibilities would 
have made the necessary exposures and conflicts 



CONTINGENT EVENTS AND PROVIDENCE. 299 

of life intensely severe ! God calls into the fold 
those who could not have borne the bleak winds 
of the mountain pasture. They are taken from 
certain sorrow which they may have been ill fitted 
to sustain, — from cares and responsibilities from 
which they would have shrunk in unconquerable 
timidity, — from a world which always has its 
crown of thorns for the gentle, retiring, sensitive 
spirit. When we see how easy the death-strug- 
gle is often made for those early summoned 
hence, how cheerfully and hopefully they sink 
to rest, how readily they resign the cup of earth- 
ly joy for the well-spring in the heavenly garden, 
we cannot but feel that there is Divine benignity 
in the mandate that calls them home. 



SERMON XXIII. 



HEAVEN. 

IT DOTH NOT TET APPEAR WHAT WE SHALL BE : BUT WE 
KNOW THAT, WHEN HE SHALL APPEAR, WE SHALL BE 

LIKE him; for we shall see him as he is, and ev- 
ery MAN THAT HATH THIS HOPE IN HIM PURIEIETH HIM- 
SELF, EVEN AS HE IS PURE. — 1 John iii. 2, 3. 

Comparatively little is made known to iis 
through the Scriptures concerning the life of 
heayeii ; and that little is given us cliiefly by ma- 
terial imagery, — by symbols which we know not 
how to interpret. It is often asked, If the great 
object of the Gospel be to fit us for heaven, why 
is not a fuller revelation of its joys made to us ? 
Why are we not enlightened as to the mode and 
laws of its being? Why have we not a map of 
the celestial city, so that we may survey before- 
hand the mansions in the Father's house made 
ready for us ? It is my present design to answer 
this question, and to sliow the consistency of the 
khid and degree of knowledge vouchsafed to us 
on this subject with the Divine wisdom and love. 

In the first place, were the future life fully laid 



HEAVEN. 301 

open to us, its brightness would throw the pres- 
ent state into utter eclipse, and make our earthly 
pilgrimage irksome and grievous. It is God's 
will that we should be happy here, that we should 
love life, husband it, prolong it, and yield it up 
only at the manifest demand of higher duty ; and 
the dimness that rests on the future makes the 
best men willing to stay here, though sure of hap- 
piness hereafter. But were heaven within their 
clear view, their longing to depart would paralyze 
their power of active ser^dce here, render them 
impatient for the final change, and turn this fair 
world into a prison-house. Now there is enough 
revealed to feed desire, and to make the faithful 
soul willing to obey tlie summons hence ; while, 
in the idea of a change, and in the uncertainty 
of its degree and circumstances, the Christian is 
contented to await his time, and to remain on a 
post of duty where he can see and know what 
makes him happy. The natural shrinking from 
an unknown condition of being sustains an inter- 
est in the present life in the hearts of those best 
fitted to die, while, when that unknown state is 
at hand, their confidence in the Divine mercy 
enables them to enter upon it without doubt or 
fear. ^ 

Again, the representations of heaven in the 
Bible are such as to adapt the inspired record to 
the needs of all classes of minds. We doubt not 
that the life of heaven is spiritual. We expect 

26 



302 HEAVEN. 

there pleasures, not of sense, but of soiiL But 
the Gospel was first preached, and is still preached 
every year, to multitudes who occupy tlie lowest 
plane of intelligence and cultiire. It goes to them 
in their coarseness and degradation ; and in that 
state how could they take in a picture of spiritual 
joy ? With their undeveloped moral natures, 
how could they feel alarm at the opposite repre- 
sentations of spiritual suffering and agony ? But 
they can appreciate the material imagery, — on 
the one hand, the golden streets, the never-set- 
ting sun, the freedom from pain, sickness, and 
sorrow, — on the other, the darkness, the imdy- 
ing worm, the unquenched fire. By these sym- 
bols their fears and hopes are aroused. They 
are led to make experiment of the teachings of 
Jesus. They learn his lessons of love and duty. 
They are born into the spiritual life. Then, with 
their heart-experience of sorrow for sin, and of 
peace and joy in believing, they gradually enter 
into the meaning of these symbols, and identify 
heaven with the purest thoughts and best affec- 
tions that they can cherish. Their conceptions 
of heaven grow with their characters. While 
they could appreciate only outward joy, heaven 
was to them merely a glorious place. A^ they 
increase in spirituality, it becomes less a place 
and more a state. It represents to them at every 
stage the highest point that they have reached, 
the utmost of blessedness that they can appre- 
hend. 



HEAVEN. 303 

To pass to another topic, I would ask, Would 
not any detailed description of the life to come 
raise more questions than it answered, — excite 
more curiosity than it gratified ? For a full de- 
scription of life in this world, what countless vol- 
umes must be written to portray the various pro- 
fessions, tastes, habits, and enjoyments of differ- 
ent ages, classes, and nations ! And can the life 
of heaven be less rich in its resources, less vari- 
ous in its pursuits and its joys ? I love to think 
of it as infinitely diversified, as, though the same, 
yet different to every soul. I believe that every 
direction which the mind can take, every bent 
which the character can assume under the guid- 
ance of religion, reaches out into eternity. There 
are here many devout inquirers into the springs 
of nature and the mysteries of science. Will not 
the broad universe be open to their survey, so 
that they may track the footprints of creative 
wisdom from world to world, and from system to 
system ? There are those who linger with pious 
reverence on the records of Providence in long 
past ages and vanished generations. May not 
the archives of a past eternity be spread for 
their research, and feed their adoration and love ? 
There have been prophets to whom the distant 
future was made present ; there are still pro- 
phetic spirits that reverently lift the veil to con- 
template developments of the Divine glory in ages 
to come. In heaven may they not be prophets 



304 HEAVEN. 

still, watching the dawn, and to less far-sighted 
spirits heralding the progress of new dispensa- 
tions of almighty love ? There are those in whom 
the imaginative element predominates in the re- 
ligious life, — poets by the gift of God, — capa- 
ble of tracing the more recondite beauties and 
harmonies of creation, and of combining its scat- 
tered rays of benignity and glory. May not a 
creative fancy in heaven, as here, be the faculty 
through which they will apprehend the Divine 
perfections, pour their own thank-offerings, and 
lead troops of kindred spirits in the chorus of 
praise ? There are still others, whose piety takes 
the direction of active, energetic philanthropy, — 
men whom the love of souls inspires for the most 
arduous services and sacrifices. May not they 
be training themselves for swift angelic ministries 
to the suffering and the sinning ? May it not be 
their mission to repeat the message of the Re- 
deemer's birth-song till the last wanderer is gath- 
ered into the fold, and there is glory to God, and 
peace, and good-will throughout the earth and 
universe ? There are, again, saintly men, ad- 
dicted to a quiet, contemplative devotion, who, 
while they cannot utter the awakening word, or 
speed the winged arrow of truth, bless their race 
by the example of a hoavenly spirit, holy, harm- 
less, undefiled, and faithful. Will not heaven 
give them the repose they love, — the rest of 
pious confidence, and calm, blissful adoration? 



HEAVEN. 305 

Thus may heaven provide for the cultivation of 
every pure taste and worthy pursuit, for the 
unrestricted exercise of every class of spiritual 
endowments. If this be the case, how could the 
whole be written out in a volume designed for 
the instruction of the ignorant, the solace of 
humble toil, the wayfarer's companion, the man- 
ual of childhood, the staff of the aged, and the 
hope of the dying ? Or, had some portions of 
this blessed life been revealed, and some threads 
of our earthly existence shown us as they are 
woven into the web of eternity, it could only 
have awakened doubt and despondency in those 
minds on whose favorite departments of thought 
and duty no light from heaven was shed. The 
silence of the record would have seemed to put 
a ban upon tastes which tliey could not help 
cherishing, and pursuits which they could not 
help loving. 

But while for these reasons a specific revela- 
tion with regard to the heavenly life was not to 
be expected, does not the very idea of immor- 
tality include the answers to many of the ques- 
tions which we might ask the most anxiously ? 
We are too little familiar with the import of the 
seeming truism, that it is we ourselves that are 
to be immortal. Heaven is too much thought of 
as an arbitrary conferment, by which we become 
at once entirely different beings, only an angel in 
place of every soul redeemed from among men, 

26* 



306 HEAVEN. 

like the troop of blessed spirits that came, one 
for every corpse on shipboard, in Coleridge's 
" Ancient Mariner." It is this idea that under- 
lies the doctrine of immediate heavenly happi- 
ness for the abandoned sinner, who certainly, 
in liis own person, is not a possible subject for 
such happiness, and all that Omnipotence could 
do would be to annihilate him, and create a pure 
spirit in his stead. The same idea appears in all 
our scepticism as to the continuance in heaven 
of anything worthy of heaven that we have loved 
and enjoyed in this world. If we are the same 
beings there as here, we must carry with us the 
tastes, affections, and habits of thinking and feel- 
ing, with which we depart this life, and those of 
them which can find scope for exercise and space 
for growth in heaven must unfold and ripen there. 
Thus is it asked. Will friends know and love each 
other there ? I find in Scripture many hints to- 
ward an affirmative answer ; but, were it not so, 
I should need an express revelation in order to 
make me believe or imagine the negative. These 
earthly affections are not only an essential part 
of our nature, but are indissolubly interwoven 
with our religious characters. Every element of 
faith and piety, every act of prayer and praise, 
is associated with the parents, teachers, and ex- 
emplars, who have helped to form our charac- 
ters, — with those who have joined us in worship, 
sustained us in our conflicts, consoled us in our 



HEAVEN. 307 

sorrows, united with us in the commemoration of 
redeeming love. To tear them from our hearts 
would be to lacerate every fibre of the spirit- 
ual life. These affections grow, too, with our 
growth in piety. I feel assured, therefore, that 
the change which brings us into more intimate 
union with our God and our Saviour must also 
render our social affections purer and more fer- 
vent. In like manner, I would say of every trait 
of mind and heart, which can grow with the 
growth of character, which at once ministers to 
the religious sentiment and is cherished by it, 
that it must needs be indestructible. The per- 
petuity of whatever can live and find appropriate 
nourishment in heaven is involved in the doctrine 
of immortality, and, so far from needing express 
revelation to prove it, I should demand for its 
disproof the clearest Scriptural testimony. 

In addition to what has been said, I would sug- 
gest, that much may have been left unrevealed 
with regard to heaven, in order to furnish room 
for the highest exercise of the imagination. Im- 
agination is not among the faculties which relig- 
ion aims to suppress ; but under the auspices of 
faith, it only assumes a broader range, and wings 
a loftier flight. Yet its realm is always that of 
the dimly seen and partially known. It shuns 
the region of definite outline and circumstantial 
detail. Were heaven all revealed, heaven would 
proffer no room for its creations, and it would 



308 HEAVEN. 

remain, in the devout as in the irreligious, an 
earth-bounded faculty, tempting the soul to grov- 
el below, instead of bearing it aloft. It seems to 
me that the Scriptural representations of the life 
to come are precisely adapted to make fancy the 
handmaid of devotion. Enough is revealed to 
give fixedness and certainty to the idea of heav- 
en. We have the great outlines of its life, the 
staple of its duties and its joys. But the sacred 
writers hardly begin to fill in these outlines. 
Their specifications are few and meagre. They 
tell us of the sea of glass, the great white throne, 
the marriage-supper of the Lamb, the white robes, 
the golden harps, — imagery that brings over the 
soul multitudinous and transporting thoughts of 
splendor, glory, joy, purity, and praise. But who 
can map with literal exactness the blissful scene 
to which these symbols point ? or to what two in- 
dependent minds can they suggest the same com- 
bination of the elements of joy ? We are sup- 
plied, as it were, with the unshaped materials, 
with which fancy may rear and furnish its own 
heavenly mansion. We are to take the pencil into 
our own hands, and to create the future of our 
hope from the colors which inspiration has thrown 
in resplendent masses upon the palette. "It doth 
not yet appear what we shall be " ; but no pure 
and lofty imagining need droop in doubt, nor need 
we fear to let the future grow more and more 
definite under successive touches ; for, however 



HEAVEN. 309 

bold the reach of fancy, we are assured that God 
has reserved for tis more and better than it has 
entered into the heart of man to conceive. Here, 
then, we have a boundless field for contempla- 
tions, through which our faith may be kept con- 
stantly on the increase ; for none believe in heav- 
en so firmly as those whose imaginations are the 
most aspiring, within the outlines, yet beyond 
the details, of positive revelation. Burning cu- 
riosity with regard to the future, the longing to 
know more and to feel more of its unrevealed 
realities, detaches the soul from earthly vanities, 
shields it against temptation, sheds over it in its 
conflicts and its trials more and more of the at- 
mosphere of heaven. And when a dear friend 
is passing or has passed behind the veil, what a 
solemn interest attaches itself to the thought of 
his personal experience of what we still behold 
so faintly ! How near we come to heaven, as 
we strive to lift the veil, as we imagine his wel- 
come to the society of the blessed, his glad amaze- 
ment at the disclosures of eternity, his strains of 
adoration, his shining path of duty, his beatific 
vision of the Redeemer, his all-pervading con- 
sciousness of the Divine presence, the merging 
of his dying prayer in praise, of his parting sigh 
in joy unutterable and eternal ! I have been 
deeply impressed with the beauty and power of 
these contemplations of heaven in reading the 
Life and Letters of John Foster, the English 



310 HEAVEN. 

essayist, one of the most saintly men that ever 
lived, the records of whose years of decline and 
infirmity make me feel as if he stood already on 
the delectable mountains, saw across the river 
of death the gates of the celestial city, and heard 
the " harpers harping with their harps." I must 
indulge myself in quoting from one of his letters 
to a friend of nearly half a century's standing, 
then at the point of death in a distant city. 

" To me a little stage farther remains under 
the darkness ; you, my dear friend, have a clear 
sight almost to the concluding point. And 
while I feel the deepest pensiveness in behold- 
ing where you stand, with but a step between 
you and death, I cannot but emphatically con- 
gratulate you 

" But, my dear friend, whither is it that you 
are going ? Where is it that you will be a few 
short weeks or days hence ? I have affecting 
cause to think and to wonder concerning that 
unseen world ; to desire, were it permitted to 
mortals, one glimpse of that mysterious econ- 
omy, to ask innumerable questions to which 
there is no answer, — what is the manner of 
existence, — of employment, — of society, — of 
remembrance, — of anticipation, — of all the sur- 
rounding revelations to our departed friends ? 
How striking to think that she* so long and 

* Referring to his wife recently deceased. 



HEAVEN. 311 

SO recently with me here, so beloved, but now 
so totally withdrawn and absent, — that she ex- 
perimentally knows all that I am in vain in- 
quiring ! 

" And a little while hence, you, my friend, 
will be an object of the same solemn medita- 
tions and wondering inquiries. It is most strik- 
ing to consider, — to realize the idea, — that 
you^ to whom I am writing these lines, who 
continue yet among mortals, who are on this 
side of the awful and mysterious veil, — that 
you will be in the midst of these grand reali- 
ties, beholding the marvellous manifestations, 
amazed and transported at your new and hap- 
py condition of existence, while your friends 
are feeling the pensiveness of your absolute 
and final absence, and thinking how, but just 
now, as it were, you were with them. 

" But we must ourselves follow you to see 
what it is that the emancipated spirits who 
have obtained their triumph over death and evil 
through the blood of the Lamb, find awaiting 
them in that nobler and happier realm of the 
great Master's empire 

" It is a delightful thing to be assured, on the 
authority of revelation, of the perfect conscious- 
ness, the intensely awakened faculties, and all the 
capacities and causes of felicity in that mysteri- 
ous, separate state ; and on the same evidence, 
together with every other rational probability, 



312 HEAVEN. 

to be confident of the reunion of those who have 
loved one another and their Lord on earth 

" I know that I slialL partake of your kindest 
wishes and remembrance in your prayers, — the 
few more prayers you have yet to offer before 
you go. WTien I may follow you, and, I earnest- 
ly hope, to rejoin you in a far better world, must 
be left to a decision that cannot at the most be 
very remote ; for yesterday completed my sixty- 
third year 

" But you, my friend, have accomplished your 
business, — your Lord's business on earth. Go, 
then, willing and delighted at his call. 

" Here I conclude, with an affecting and sol- 
emn consciousness that I am speaking to you for 
the last time in this world. Adieu ! then, my 
ever dear and faithful friend. Adieu — for a 
while ! May I meet you erelong where we shall 
never more say farewell ! " 

In view of such a parting, we might well ask, 
What more can we need? Could the clearest 
vision of heaven inspire a more elastic faith, a 
more sublime confidence ? Nay, does not the 
very dimness that rests upon the future world 
impart added grandeur to the spectacle of these 
two old men interchanging their greetings on its 
confines, with entire certainty that they will soon 
be renewed in the house not made with hands ? 

There may be yet another reason why we 
have so little detailed information with regard 



HEAVEN. 313 

to heaven. There is no doubt much which we 
could not know, — for which human speech fur- 
nishes no words. Language is the daughter of 
experience. It speaks of what we know, testi- 
fies of what we have seen, and can convey to us 
nothing, the elements of which have not in some 
form entered into our experience. It can give 
the blind no idea of colors, or the deaf of sounds. 
Now there can be no doubt that in the future life 
our mode of being, of perception, of recognition, 
of communication, will be essentially different 
from what it is here, and perhaps so different that 
nothing within our earthly experience could fur- 
nish terms for its description. St. Paul's phrase 
with reference to it, " a spiritual body," is still 
uninterpreted, and involves a mystery, which 
" the great teacher. Death, " alone can solve. 
All that we can say is, that it may denote some 
freer, more ethereal embodiment of the soul, — 
some mode of existence midway between that of 
Him, who is emphatically a Spirit, and our pres- 
ent gross material forms ; but of such a state of 
being we can have no conception prior to ex- 
perience. St. Paul says that in his vision of 
heaven he " heard unspeakable words, which it 
is not lawful [or rather, is not possible] for a man 
to utter, " undoubtedly referring, not to any ex- 
press prohibition, but to the essential poverty 
and inadequacy of language, which forbade the 
disclosure. 

27 



314 HEAVEN. 

But, with all our ignorance, we have full assur- 
ance on one point, and that the most essential to 
our present improvement and happiness. " When 
God shall appear," shall draw near the soul in 
death and judgment, " we shall be like him." 
And if like him, like Jesus, his express image, 
whose heart is all laid open to us, whose traits of 
spiritual beauty and excellence are within our 
clear view. To be like Christ, — need we know, 
could we ask more ? Were we fully like him 
now, it would be heaven here, — heaven under 
burdens, trials, crosses numberless, — heaven, 
though the world around us were filled with vio- 
lence. This one idea outweighs all the material 
imagery, which St. John has heaped up like a 
mountain of gold and precious stones on which 
we may climb to get a glimpse of heaven. It 
did so in his view ; for the form of the Redeemer 
is foremost in every scene of his vision. He is 
the light of the golden city, the object of hom- 
age to the adoring host. They sing his song on 
the sea of glass. It is he who leads them by 
living fountains of waters, and they " follow the 
Lamb whithersoever he goeth." 

Our text gives us yet another trait of the life 
of heaven. "We shall see God as he is," — shall 
see him as Jesus ever saw him, — shall enter in- 
to the depth of significance that lay in his heart 
when he said, " My Father." Here we behold 
God chiefly through outward forms of his crear 



HEAVEN. 315 

tion and agents of his Providence ; and, though 
in our seasons of highest devotion clearer and 
fuller views of his character dawn upon our souls, 
we find it hard to retain or recall them. There, 
through what mode of manifestation we know not, 
but undoubtedly through the more intimate con- 
nection which unembodied spirits may have with 
the Infinite Spirit, we shall be brought into a 
communion with him, corresponding in its clear- 
ness and continuity to our face-to-face converse 
with one another. 

Our text adds, — "Every man that hath this 
hope in him purifieth himself, even as God is 
pure." The heaven of the New Testament de- 
mands prepared and congenial spirits. What ele- 
ment of happiness does it offer to the impure, the 
resentful, the worldly, the sensual, the frivolous ? 
What has it that can attract the heart which loves 
not God, and seeks not to be like him ? Every 
thought of heaven impresses upon us the need of 
a closer walk with God on earth. If there we 
are to be like him, we must have grown like him 
here. If there we are to see him as he is, we 
must have already drawn nigh to him in prayer 
and praise, and lived near him in daily obedience 
and devotion. Then may we greet death in tones 
of solemn welcome, and say, " Thou comest not 
to destroy, but to crown my hopes. Thy dark 
wing shall waft my spirit to Him whom not hav- 
ing seen I love, and in whose nearer presence is 
joy unspeakable and full of glory." 



SEEMON XXIY. 



THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 

EVEKT BRANCH THAT BEARETH FRUIT HE PURGETH [i. 6. 
PRUNETh] IT, THAT IT MAY BRING FORTH MORE FRUIT. — 

John XV. 2. 

Jesus and his Apostles were walking at mid- 
night on the vine-embowered path that led to the 
Mount of Olives. The full moon shone on rich 
clusters of grapes loading every tendril, and al- 
ready far advanced toward maturity. What a 
contrast between the verdure and fruitfulness 
that overhung their steps, and the vanished, with- 
ered hopes that made the hearts of the disciples 
sad and desolate ! Not thus, however, had the 
vines on the hill and by the road-side looked a 
few weeks before. Under the vine-dresser's hand, 
in the very infancy of that year's life, they had 
sustained seemingly rude and merciless mutila- 
tion. The lower shoots had been lopped off; 
the luxuriance of the last year's growth had 
been pruned ; and amputated stocks, bald, bare 
branches, had projected their unsightly outlines 



THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 317 

against the rocks and the sky. Had the pruning 
been less thorough, the clusters would not have 
hung so thick or so rich ; and the neglected 
vines, yielding grapes worthy neither of the table 
nor the vintage, would have been fit only to be 
trampled under foot or cast into the fire. The 
sap, that would have flowed to waste through the 
lower tendrils, had sought the topmost branches. 
The vital energy, that would have been exhaust- 
ed in useless foliage, had elaborated the bud, 
the blossom, and the grape. " Thus," says our 
Saviour in the beautiful parable which gives us 
our text, " thus will it be with you, as the heav- 
enly vine-dresser applies the pruning-knife of be- 
reavement and desolation to your fearful and 
anxious spirits. You have clung to my earthly 
presence. You dread desertion, contempt, and 
persecution. You cannot brook the thought of 
what awaits you on the morrow. But did I re- 
main at your side to anticipate your wants, to 
meet danger in your stead, and to confine to my 
local and material presence the thoughts, affec- 
tions, and aspirations that ought to mount heav- 
enward, the Comforter would not come, your 
higher natures would lack their full development, 
your lives would bear little of the fruit which I 
have chosen and ordained you that ye should 
bear. But if I go home to the Father, and leave 
you to a straitened and afflicted lot upon earth, 
the tendrils of your nature that cling to earthly 

27* 



318 THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 

supports being lopped away, your souls, like the 
noble vine, will send out their shoots heaven- 
ward, laden with the ripening fruits of trust, 
love, and self-denying virtue. The knife indeed 
cuts to the quick ; but it is in the hand of my 
Father and your Father, who, because the vine 
has begun to bear fruit, prunes it that it may 
bring forth more fruit." 

It seems to me, my friends, that there is no 
text in the Bible richer in beautiful significance, 
in comfort and encouragement, than that which 
I have chosen this morning. It presents one of 
those perfect analogies between the outward and 
the spiritual universe, which could have been 
drawn only by him whose prerogative it was to 
" take the things of God and show them unto 
men," but which, when suggested, we can all 
appreciate and feel. My text has of late been 
brought forcibly to my mind by conversations with 
some of you, with whom I could see that it had 
been verified in the quickening impulses given to 
pious feeling and holy resolution by severe do- 
mestic bereavement. Yet it has its significance 
and fulfilment not only at distinctly marked 
epochs of sorrow, but equally in the common 
experience of life, as we pass from youth to 
manhood or womanhood, and thence to the me- 
ridian or the decline of our earthly pilgrimage. 

1. The principle of our text is verified in the 
gradual contraction of our earthly horizon as we 



THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 319 

advance in life. The youth sees the whole world 
before him. The fruit of all the trees in the gar- 
den hangs in his sight, and he seems to hear the 
voice, " Of every tree thou mayest eat." His 
whole future is dim indeed, but hopeful. He 
forms large plans, cherishes large desires. His 
purposes, his efforts, reach out in a thousand dif- 
ferent directions. Pleasure, business, honor, pros- 
perity, domestic joy, social advantages, all seem 
within his grasp. With vast longings, and with 
the direction of his life still undetermined, his 
spiritual mdustry, however sincere, is liable to be 
dissipated ; and, did this condition last long, his 
character would remain unformed, his principles 
feeble, his moral attainments low and unsatis- 
fying. But, even without the consciousness of 
disappointment on his part. Providence early ap- 
plies the pruning-knife. He is confined within 
some single walk of industry, — has one estab- 
lished home, sphere of duty, circle of friends, and 
round of enjoyments. His place in the social 
scale, the modicum of success and honor within 
his reach, is determined. Bounds, over which 
he cannot pass, are set to his earthly life. Yet 
within those bounds his desires and active pow- 
ers are not only strong as ever, but have sup- 
planted the spasmodic, impulsive energy of youth 
by a maturer and more sustained vigor. And 
has he the principle of duty, the love of God, in 
his heart ? Then must the life, limited in every 



320 THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 

earthward direction, mount heavenward. The 
stream pent np must rise toward its source. 
The desires must gravitate toward objects that 
promise them satisfaction ; and, if they have be- 
gun to seek God and heaven, the epoch when 
they are made to feel tlie finiteness and insuffi- 
ciency of all lower good must be the time when 
they seize on the divine and infinite, with a grasp 
too tenacious ever to be relaxed. The active 
powers crave an unlimited field for their activ- 
ity ; and, if they have learned to labor for the 
soul's well-being, then the experience of their 
earthly limitation must direct their whole energy 
to the sphere where they can never be cramped 
or baffled. 

In point of fact, it is precisely at this period of 
life that we often witness the most rapid growth 
of character, — its growth in evil no less than in 
good. The dispositions and traits of character, 
which one manifests at his very entrance upon 
the cares and duties of active business or of do- 
mestic life, soon and fast acquire a fixedness and 
depth which render essential change exceedingly 
improbable. And where a right direction has 
been taken in childhood or youth, it is amazing 
with what sudden maturity we often see a young 
man or woman clothed, so that the person, who 
out of the immediate home circle had seemed a 
mere cipher, becomes at once, on assuming an 
independent position in life, a centre of benefi- 



THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 321 

cent influence, a burning and shining light, an 
ornament to society, a pillar in the Church of 
Clirist. All this takes place, indeed, not without 
vigorous and devout self-discipline, yet through 
the instrumentality of that Providence which 
pruned the already fruitful branch that it might 
bring forth more fruit. 

2. Our text is equally verified in connection 
with the inevitable disappointments of maturer 
years. I refer not now to such disappointments 
as attract the notice and sympathy of others, and 
go by the name of trials and sorrows, but to a 
much larger class, concealed from general obser- 
vation, and even from the most friendly eye. Of 
the buds on the tree of life, many more drop than 
blossom. But few of our expectations are real- 
ized, and those few but partially ; or, if they keep 
tlieir promise to the sense, they break it to the 
heart, and success or joy in fruition falls far short 
of what it had seemed in prospect. Even after 
the day-dreams of youth have ceased, we almost 
all set for ourselves a much higher mark than 
we reach. "We aim at wealth, and secure a bare 
competence. We look for eminence, and rise not 
above mediocrity. We lay well-matured plans, 
and they are defeated we hardly know how. 
We strive for influence, and find wills that refuse 
to yield to our argument or persuasion. We 
depend on co-operation, and our helpers drop 
away in the hour of need. We look forward to 



322 THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 

this or that epoch of felicity, — it comes, but 
brings as much care as joy. We say to ourselves, 
" Let me only attain this or that stage of success, 
and I am content, " — we reach it, and find that 
it has not advanced our happiness one jot, but 
only created new cravings. In all pursuits that 
begin and end in this life, it is as if we were 
drawing water in sieves ; and for the brimming 
cup that we mean to fill, how often do we pour 
into it only a few scanty drops ! And he who has 
not found access to the water of life keeps on 
drawing with his sieve at the broken cistern. 
But have we learned the way to the well-spring, 
and taken our first draught of its living waters ? 
Then all this experience of earthly disappoint- 
ment leads our souls to a more constant resort to 
the source of unfailing joy. We find that we 
were not made to realize full satisfaction in this 
world, — that 

" The choicest pleasure earth can give 
Will starve the hungry mind/' 

And then there reaches us from every earthly 
scene the invitation, — 

" Come, and the Lord will feed your souls 
"With more substantial meat, 
With such as saints in glory love. 
With such as angels eat." 

Think not that I speak of this discipline of 
constant disappointment in the tone of complaint. 
To my mind there could be no arrangement so 
merciful for immortal beings, strangers on earth. 



THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 323 

invited citizens of a better country. Did every 
thing prosper to our minds, did attainment always 
answer to expectation, and fruition equal hope, 
rarely would our thoughts and efforts rise above 
the passing scene. In the certainty with which 
we could calculate on earthly joy, we should 
lose all desire of heavenly blessedness. But now, 
while God gives us outward blessings enough to 
make our pilgrimage a happy one, in the perpet- 
ual disproportion between what we seek and what 
we attain, between what we hope and what we 
enjoy, he is constantly saying to us, " Arise and 
depart, for this is not your rest." If we have 
once turned our faces heavenward, heaven gains 
upon our affections by every hold which our spir- 
its lose upon the passing world. It is through 
the discipline of daily disappointment that our 
souls grow in the love of God and the life of duty. 
The more we feel the uncertainty of all outward 
dependence and hope, the more does that hidden 
life which we lead with God, that peace which 
the world could not give and cannot take away, 
develop itself in our hearts. Thanks, then, to 
the heavenly vine-dresser, who daily prunes the 
lower branches of the vine, that its sap may rise 
in an ever fuller current to those topmost boughs 
where the clusters all ripen for heaven. 

3. Our text is also verified painfully, yet joyful- 
ly, in connection with those severe bereavements, 
which are the lot of all, and which, grievous 



324 THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 

as we find them, are no doubt, in God's eye, 
the Christian's privilege. Probably there are 
none who cherish so firm a faith in a Providence 
always kind, as those disciples of Christ who 
have sustained the heaviest losses in the circle 
of their kindred and affection. They have felt 
these losses only the more severely for their re- 
ligious faith ; for it is the ofiice of religion to 
make love more tender, and to strengthen the 
bonds of kindred. But every sorrow has opened 
to tliem new sources of spiritual strength, has 
drawn them into closer communion with God, 
has made thoughts of heaven dearer and more 
constant, has removed weights from their spirits 
and clogs from their feet in the way of duty, has 
enabled them to run with new vigor and perse- 
verance the race that is set before them, and 
brought them into more intimate converse with 
Him whom they follow in trial and suffering, 
that they may partake of his victory and his 
glory. 

But in order that this discipline of sorrow 
should perform its due ofiice, there must first be 
a preparation of spirit. Afiliction does not, so 
often as is supposed, lead to the formation oi 
the religious character, though when it is once 
formed, it never fails, I believe, to minister to 
its rapid growth. It often gives expression and 
firmness to principles that were feeble, to resolu- 
tions that were faint, to an embryo piety which 



THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 325 

the cares and joys of unbroken prosperity might 
have suppressed and withered. It fixes the re- 
ligious purpose which had previously flickered 
and wavered. It fastens on God the trust and 
love which had been partly his, yet much divided 
and often turned aside. It rebukes and chastens 
away sins which had checked the spirit of prayer, 
and precluded the full enjoyment of religious 
peace. Often, too, can the afflicted bear testi- 
mony that the stroke of a bereaving Providence 
came just when it was most needed, — at that 
stage of progress when some decisive experience 
was essential, to fix the choice, to give a perma- 
nent direction to the thoughts and affections, to 
put the seal to tlie holiest vows and loftiest pur- 
poses, to write the sentence of inviolable conse- 
cration on the whole coming life. 

Yes, to the eyes of the heavenly witnesses that 
compass our path, these afflictions from the Divine 
hand seem to fall, not in desolating, showers, but 
to drop as the gentle rain and to distil like the 
quiet dew on the plants of our Father's planting, 
reviving that which was ready to perish, and 
ripening fruits to be garnered in heaven. While 
we remain on eartli, indeed^ our sense of loss and 
loneliness may never suffer us to carry our resig- 
nation to the point of thanksgiving for these sor- 
rows. But I cannot doubt that, when in a better 
world the innocent and holy who have been taken 
from us shall be again united with us, we shall 

28 



326 THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 

look back on these afflictive mercies as among 
the choicest blessings of a benignant Providence, 
and shall own, with a fuller evidence than we 
are now conscious of, that the Father of our 
spirits pruned the already fruitful plants in his 
vineyard, only that they might bring forth more 
fruit. 

Such, then, is the course of Providence for 
our growth in duty and in piety. I close by sug- 
gesting one obvious inference from the train of 
thought in which I have led you, namely, the 
rich advantage, the priceless privilege, of early 
piety. It is for the culture and sanctification of 
our immortal natures, that the whole system un- 
der which we live is arranged. God's course of 
discipline with every individual is precisely that 
which he needs for the development and per- • 
fection of his character. The successive stages 
of our outward experience are the successive 
schools, lower, and higher, in which we are to be 
trained for heaven. How essential, then, that we 
should begin with the first of the series, and gain 
the teachings of each and all ! Under what im- 
mense disadvantages must we enter on the later 
stages of the course, if the instruction and disci- 
pline of its earlier portions have been slighted 
and neglected ! What an inconceivable loss is 
that of any part of a probation season, in which 
God himself deigns to be our teacher ! But that 
he may fill that office towards us, we must give 



THE HEAVENLY VINE-DRESSER. 327 

heed in youth to that fundamental commandment, 
" My son, give me tliy heart." 

My young friends, give him your hearts. Then 
shall his daily Providence nourish and strengthen 
you. Every event shall prove a blessing, every 
trial a godsend, every cloud shall rain down right- 
eousness upon you. All things shall be yours. 
Every experience of life shall be an experience 
of growing peace and joy as followers of Christ. 
The discipline of disappointment and sorrow lies 
before you, — will open upon you sooner than 
you imagine. Will you encounter its woes, and 
reject its revenue of spiritual blessedness ? — drink 
the full bitterness of the cup and spurn its heal- 
ing and strengthening admixture ? — bear every 
burden, bow under every sorrow, and yet refuse 
that divine ministry which can make the burdens 
blessings, and the sorrow joy ? that you could 
see how surely and how soon you must pass 
through scenes, in which without the spirit of 
piety all will be dark and desolate, but in which 
you can feel a heavenly presence and find the 
darkness light around you ! Come young, come 
now, to the service, and fill your hearts with the 
love of God, and then shall everything be rich 
and beautiful in its season, and nothing more so 
than those sad and sorrowful portions of your lot 
in life, in wliicli God will reveal himself, and an- 
gels minister, and heaven be open to you. 



SERMON XXY. 



THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 

THESE ARE THEY WHICH CAME OUT OP GREAT TRIBULA- 
TION. — Revelation vii. 14. 

Whether a race of finite and imperfect beings 
could have been trained for any worthy end, or 
have reached a state of conscious happiness, with- 
out the ministry of suffering, we are not compe- 
tent to say. It may, however, be plausibly main- 
tained, that, as self-consciousness must precede 
our knowledge of the outward world, and our 
cognizance of the finite our conception of the in- 
finite, so must we have had some experience of 
suffering, in order to obtain the idea of happiness 
as something oA^er and above existence. Wheth- 
er this be tlie case or not, it is certain that very 
many of our happiest experiences, and of our 
best frames of mind and traits of character, are 
to be traced, if not to the direct agency, at least 
to the memory, of grief and wrong. There is no 
exaggeration in Dickens's story of the Haunted 



THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 329 

Man, in which the supernatural agent, who re- 
lieved the hero of his remembrance of evil and 
sorrow, is represented as having robbed him, not 
only of the joy of life, but of all the genial, ten- 
der, sympathetic elements of his character. The 
beneficent influences flowing from such remem- 
brances will be my subject this morning. 

I might remind you, in the first place, that 
the lowest degradation into which a human be- 
ing can sink is a state in which there is no reten- 
tiveness, nay, hardly a transient consciousness, 
of painful emotion. Let a child, born in sin, be 
cast in very infancy upon the bleak world, with- 
out shelter, education, or guidance, exposed to 
the pelting of the elements, spurned and buffeted 
at every hand's turn, a vagrant in the lanes and 
along the wharves of a great city, — that child 
becomes in his very infancy almost invulnerable 
to every outward influence, and incapable of 
feeling neglect or injury ; but in this process he 
grows up an absolute brute. Even in the satis- 
faction of his bodily appetites there is neither 
discrimination nor enjoyment ; and in cold and 
hunger the limbs and stomach scarcely tell their 
story to the intellect. He is incapable of attach- 
ment and of gratitude. Gentleness cannot tame 
him, nor can severity awe him. As the frozen 
limb must be made sensitive to pain, before it 
is capable of healthy circulation or free motion, 
the first step towards making him happy will be 

28* 



330 THE MEMORY OP GRIEF AND WRONG. 

to unseal tlie fountain of sorrow. He must weep 
before he can enjoy. His awakening into moral 
life will be attended at least with pensiveness, 
probably with intense suffering ; and without this 
he will live and die like a brute. 

Take next the case of one who has fallen into 
loathsome degradation from a favored and happy 
early lot. That fall was not without frequent 
and severe suffering, probably not without full 
as much wrong received as committed. But 
the degraded being has lost his sensibility. The 
fountain of tears is dried up. He now bears 
physical privation or distress with a dogged res- 
oluteness, — with a depraved stoicism. You can- 
not arouse such a being to the consciousness of 
present misery. Rags, hunger, blows, the alms- 
house, the prison-cell, have become congenial ; 
and the traces of every new hardship or inflic- 
tion are like those of the arrow in the air. Nor 
yet can you excite penitence or remorse by any 
moral representation, however pungent or attrac- 
tive, of the evil and misery of guilt or the love- 
liness of virtue. You must go back to the days 
of innocence, — to the earliest steps in the evil 
path. You must awaken the remembrance of 
obsolete wrong and sorrow. You must recall 
the prodigal's first wretched pilgrimage from the 
father's house. You must arouse in the pres- 
ent self sympathy with the past, the long past 
self. In this way alone can you call forth the 



THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 331 

resolution, " I will arise and go to my father." 
Thus true to nature is our Saviour's parable, 
when he makes the lost son come to himself, 
remember his father's house, and derive from 
this remembrance the germ of penitence, the 
purpose of return. Thus true to all experience 
was the prolonged weeping of the outcast sin- 
ner at the feet of Jesus ; and, had she . not sor- 
rowed much, she could not have loved much, 
or have been much forgiven. 

Let us pass now to experiences that lie more 
within our own sphere of consciousness, and, 
first, to domestic happiness. We can hardly be 
aware how much of the joy, how much of the 
purity and tenderness, of our home relations 
springs from the very events which we most 
dread, or from the shadow or apprehension of 
them. Two young hearts are plighted to each 
other in the most fervent love, and enter on 
their united life under the most prosperous au- 
spices and with the highest hopes. Let every- 
thing answer to their anticipations, — let their 
life flow on without grief or fear, — avert from 
tlxem the cares from which they shrink, the re- 
sponsibilities which they deprecate, — and their 
love is either suddenly exhaled, or gradually 
frittered away. They grow mutually intoler- 
ant of their necessary differences of taste, opin- 
ion, and feeling. The glaring sunlight in which 
they live shows them in exaggerated forms each 



332 THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 

other's defects and foibles. The hot glow of 
unintermitted prosperity withers those filaments 
of tender, delicate respect, confidence, forbear- 
ance, and attachment which are essential to 
their permanent union. If they remain with- 
out mutual discord or dislike, it is through the 
negative power of passive good-nature, while the 
heart-ties are all the while growing weaker, so 
that their dissolution would be more and more 
slightly and transiently felt. 

But, with their first weighty cares or solici- 
tudes, they are drawn into an intimacy of feeling 
closer than they had ever imagined before. The 
anxiety, the suffering, the remembrance of which 
thrills through their hearts over the cradle of 
their first-born, while it consecrates the child to 
their love, renews with double emphasis every 
obligation of the marriage covenant. The peril, 
the transient shadow of death, through which 
the new-born has passed into life, is the most 
blessed experience to the parents, who thence- 
forth can cherish a mutual forbearance, sympa- 
thy, and helpfulness, to create which the ardor 
of youthful passion would have been wholly in- 
adequate. Similar is the ministry of every pain- 
ful domestic epoch. Every watching by the sick- 
bed, every weary night and anxious day, every 
anxiety and grief borne together, evokes from 
the depths of sympathy a still lower deep, and 
binds the kindred hearts in still closer bonds. 



THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 333 

After every such passage in life, each member 
of the household circle seems more essential to 
the rest than ever before ; and, in this strength- 
ening of mutual dependence and attachment, 
their joy in each other, though more sober in 
its manifestations, is constantly becoming more 
deep, full, and satisfying. 

Then, when bereavement comes, it comes with 
its mission of love. One voice hushed, every 
other voice grows more tender. One kind min- 
istry suspended, each of the surviving circle be- 
comes more assiduous, considerate, and faithful. 
The love withdrawn from earth seems not so 
much lost, as diffused through the hearts of 
those who yet remain ; and though outward 
sources of joy can never flow so bright and 
high as before, their joy in one another, their 
mutual trust and sympathy, are rendered more 
pure, entire, and fervent. The cup of bereave- 
ment is indeed bitter, and the whole heart re- 
coils when it is offered, and even more from 
its repetition than when it is first mingled for 
us ; nor would we ever lose the fresh and re- 
gretful remembrance of those no longer with 
us. Yet we have felt that these griefs have 
unsealed hidden fountains of affection in our 
own hearts, and in those of our near kindred, 
and enabled us at once to impart and to re- 
ceive more richly all the kindly commerce of 
domestic intimacy. Then, too, with the very 



334 THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 

seasons of our severest apprehension or sorrow 
there are associated so many thoughts of peace, 
so many expressions of kindness, so many offices 
of friendship and affection, that they make green 
spots for memory to look back upon, and are 
among the last of our life-experiences of which 
we would willingly have the remembrance blot- 
ted out. 

A similar view presents itself with regard to 
our religious characters. Could those of us, who 
are endeavoring to live in the fear of God and 
the love of Christ, trace back the growth of the 
religious life in our hearts, we should find that, 
while the germ was there before care or sorrow 
had taken strong hold upon us, yet in many in- 
stances its first decided development and rapid 
increase were in connection with pain, perplex- 
ity, or grief. It was the clouding over of earthly 
prospects, that opened to us a clear and realiz- 
ing view of heaven. It was the failure of fond 
hopes, that sealed our determination to lay up 
treasures where hope cannot fail. It was the 
falling away of objects of our most confident 
dependence, that cast us upon the Most High 
as our only enduring refuge and support. It 
was keen disappointment in things outward, 
that turned our earnest and anxious thought 
to those inward resources, to that spiritual life, 
whicli wells up from an inexhaustible fountain 
in the heart at one with God and Christ. Were 



THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 335 

we to lose tlic more pensive or sorrowful chap- 
ters of the past, we must tear up by the roots 
and cast away with them the very portions of 
our natures and characters that fill the present 
with peace and the future with hope, 

I have spoken of the sheltered scenes of home, 
and of the interior life of the soul. In the out- 
ward relations of society, we are equally indebt- 
ed to the ministry of affliction. How many are 
the pure and virtuous friendships, now sources 
of unalloyed gladness and improvement, which 
had their commencement in a common grief, or 
in a burden of solicitude or sorrow, which one, 
whom previously we had not known how to 
prize, hastened to bear with us, or we with 
him ! Of the many bonds of cordial esteem 
and affection, which cross and recross each 
other around the same communion-altar or in 
the same worsliipping assembly, between a pas- 
tor and his flock, or between fellow-worship- 
pers, how many there are, (and those the most 
sacred and tender,) that had their origin in 
trial or in grief ! How many of the most de- 
voted offices of Christian kindness, which give 
a glow and charm to prosperity, first began to 
be extended in adversity ! Take away, my 
friends, from our religious union all that has 
borne a sad aspect, — our mutual counsel and 
consolation in doubt or sorrow, our united 
prayers by the bedside, our last joint offices of 



336 THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 

piety over the dead, our intercessions for one 
another in the sanctuary, — there would be lit- 
tle left to unite us, little reason why we should 
worship and commune together, and we should 
fall asunder as isolated human units, each to 
feel out his own solitary way to the grave and 
to heaven. 

In old age we can also trace the genial influ- 
ence of sorrow. As the cloud, that has flashed 
its angry lightnings and poured its desolating 
showers, retreats fringed with gold and crim- 
son, and spanned with the glorious bow of God's 
unchanging promise, so do the griefs that have 
been the heaviest and the most cheerless, when 
they lie in the remote horizon of the past, glow 
with celestial radiance and divine beauty. As 
the aged Christian looks back on the conflicts 
and sorrows of earlier years, every cloud has 
its rainbow, every retreating storm dies away 
in whispers of peace. Not in its bitterness and 
agony does the past come up, but with its 
thoughts of consolation and promise, its breath- 
ings of immortality, its hopes triumphant over 
death and the grave. There lie in the back- 
ground conflicts stern and arduous, — they can 
never be renewed ; but the Christian's victory 
in them was once and for ever. There recur 
to the memory vanished joys that cannot be re- 
stored ; but the peace of God that came in and 
filled the heart when they fled remains there 



THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 337. 

still. Friends, from whom it seemed more than 
death to part, yet live in dear remembrance ; 
but from their vacant places the soul turns to the 
goodly company of the beloved and the holy, who 
are making ready the heavenly welcome. Take 
away the remembrance of what life has had of 
sadness, and 'you would startle the aged disciple 
from the brink of heaven, drown the hope of im- 
mortality, and bring back the thronging interests 
and joys of former years to run riot in the worn- 
out heart. It is the softened, painless memory 
of trial and of grief, that feeds the spirit of pa- 
tient, cheerful resignation, reconciles the soul to 
dissolution as it draws near, and sustains the will- 
ingness to depart, the desire to be with Christ. 

I have spoken chiefly of the sorrows that come 
to us by the direct appointment of Providence. 
Are there any of us who can look back on wrong 
and injury done to us by our fellow-men ? Even 
this, if we were wise, we would not wish to for- 
get. Far more noble is it to remember in full, 
and yet forgive, — to retain our sensitiveness un- 
impaired, and yet to take the offending brother to 
our hearts as if he had done us no wrong. Thus 
only can we make the wounds of carelessness, un- 
kindness, envy, or malice, permitted, though not 
wrought by Providence, coincide in their blessed 
ministry with the griefs that flow from the hand 
of God. Thus do we turn our enemy into a ben- 
efactor, by making him the unconscious instru- 

29 



338 THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 

ment of calling out in our hearts traits more ele- 
vated, Christlike, Godlike, than without his agen- 
cy we could have put into exercise. The diadem 
of universal sovereignty on our Saviour's head 
would have been a silly bawble. Those who 
platted the crown of thorns for his brow pre- 
pared for him a diadem, which, labelled with 
the Father, forgive them, can never fade from 
the faith and love of humanity. 

Finally, the connection in which our text 
stands leads us to extend the benign ministry of 
sorrow to the world where sorrow is unknown. 
You must have been struck, I think, with the 
constant reference to earthly trial and grief in 
St. John's representations of lieaven. Their re- 
demption from it is the burden of the ascriptions 
of the ransomed host to their glorified Saviour. 
Freedom from all the ills, hardships, and suffer- 
ings of earth furnishes the most glowing portions 
of the picture of the New Jerusalem. The fre- 
quent trials of the present state, its disappoint- 
ed hopes, defeated plans, withered joys, may, 
far along in the heavenly life, supply the term 
of comparison, reveal the measure of our hap- 
piness, quicken the flow of adoring gratitude, 
and sustain a full consciousness of the felicity 
in which we are embosomed. The ever-new ar- 
dor of enjoyment, the unceasing flow of thank- 
fulness, the idea of deliverance, of redemption, 
inseparable from the song of praise to God and 



THE MEMORY OF GRIEF AND WRONG. 339 

the Lamb, will no doubt distinguish ransomed 
men from those of the heavenly host who have 
never suffered, so that it shall be said of them, 
not in pity, but in sympathy with their intense 
gladness, " These are they which came out of 
great tribulation." 



SERMON XXYI. 



COMMUNION OF THE DEAD WITH THE LIYING. 

I AM THY FELLOW-SERVANT, AND OP THY BRETHREN THE 

PROPHETS. — Kevelation xxii. 9. 

So said the angel that showed St. John the 
tree of life, and talked with him of the joys of 
heaven. He was an earth-born angel, trained 
by arduous duty and stern conflict for a holy 
and exalted ministry in God's nearer presence. 
It was in a vision that the Apostle beheld him ; 
and a vision denotes, with emphasis, seeing- ; that 
is, a clearer, deeper, truer insight than is enjoyed 
in the usual condition of the faculties. It was 
not fables or allegories, but realities and truths 
appertaining to the spiritual world, that were un- 
folded to the seers of the Old and New Testament 
in vision. The inward eye was opened. They 
beheld things of which the external sense cannot 
take cognizance, and which they could describe 
only by images and symbols that feebly represent- 



COMMUNION OF THE DEAD WITH THE LIVING. 341 

ed the impressions made iipon their own minds. 
I have chosen this text in order to speak to you 
of the nearness of heaven to earth, and of our 
connection and communion with the great spirit- 
ual family. I cannot think of heaven as a sepa- 
rate, far-ofiF mansion or city of the redeemed, but 
as in close connection with the world in which 
we live. I believe that the members of the heav- 
enly society, even now, sympathize with us, re- 
joice in our virtue, and minister to our spiritual 
growth. Let us look at some of the grounds and 
uses of this belief. 

There are many sayings of Jesus, and incidents 
in his life, which imply tlie intimate communion 
of the dead with the living. One of the most 
striking features of his life is the frequency and 
nearness of his converse with the spiritual world. 
He never speaks of angels and just men made 
perfect, as if there were a weary distance to be 
crossed from them to us, or from us to them. 
They are often with him, — at his birth, in his 
temptation, and in his agony, they come uncalled, 
— they watch by liis sepulchre, and wait on his 
ascension. The spirits of the long-dead talk with 
him on the mountain. His voice to the widow's 
son, his powerful word at the tomb of Lazarus, 
seem addressed to souls not afar off, but within 
call, — near the scenes from which they' had 
gone, and among the friends who thought them 
lost for ever. He promises, also, his own spirit- 

29* 



342 COMMUNION OF THE DEAD 

ual presence with his followers, when he shall be 
no longer visible to the outward eye. 

Among other touching allusions to the connec- 
tion between the dead and the living, we cannot 
but assign a prominent place to that saying of 
our Saviour, — " Joy shall be in heaven over one 
sinner that repenteth." In this joy we cannot 
imagine the higher orders of the spiritual family 
as partaking, without its being shared by the 
penitent's kindred and friends in heaven. How 
intimate is the relation between the two worlds 
implied in the thought which these words sug- 
gest ! The faint, lowly sigh of the contrite heart 
sweeps in glad harmony over the golden lyres, and 
wakes among the blessed a new song of thanks- 
giving. The first pulsations of spiritual life in the 
outcast sinner beat in the souls of the sinless, and 
every throb of godly sorrow on earth pours new 
joy through the ranks of the redeemed. 

It is said that this near connection of heaven 
with earth must interfere with the perfect happi- 
ness of those in heaven, from their view of the 
painful discipline appointed to many of their near- 
est and best friends ? I reply, that, whether they 
behold the trials of their friends or not, they must 
know, from their own remembered experience, 
that sorrow awaits all who enter into life. But 
they no longer dread for others the angel-minis- 
tries of adversity, which they now fully recognize 
for themselves. They behold universal Provi- 



WITH THE LIVING. 343 

dence everywhere from seeming evil educing the 
highest good, and thus can acquiesce with solemn 
joy in whatever afflictions are appointed for those 
whom they hope one day to welcome as their com- 
panions in glory, even as the Father himself, who 
loves us all better than we can love each other, 
dwells in serene and eternal happiness, while he 
mingles the cup of sorrow and agony for his 
children. 

Is it asked, how heaven can be thus near, and 
yet unseen ? I reply, that the invisible presence 
of the children of God is no more mysterious than 
his own. They may be all around us, without 
our discerning them, because our spiritual vision 
is not strong and clear enough to behold them, — 
even as the minute creation, that fills air, earth, 
and sea, remained for ages unknown, for lack of 
a proper medium through which to view it. Our 
Saviour saw the dead and talked with them ; for 
in him the spiritual vision was clear and full. 
And when his religion shall become supreme 
and all-pervading, and generations shall come 
forward, as they will in the latter days, bathed 
from infancy in the light and love of his Gospel, 
the free communion with heaven may be opened, 
the tabernacle of God be with men, and the union 
of the two worlds form as much a part of the dis- 
tinct, consciousness of every disciple as it did of 
the Saviour himself. 

I prize the belief of the communion of the 



344 COMMUNION OF THE DEAD 

dead with the living, on account of the encour- 
agement to religious effort which their sympathy 
gives us. We all seek sympathy, and to secure 
it we often become followers of each other more 
than of Jesus. We walk slower than we need, 
that we may not part company with our halting 
fellow-pilgrims. We hang about our persons tlie 
same weights, and cherish the same easily beset- 
ting sins, as those who run the race at our side. 
And when, in any way, our consciences prompt 
us to walk otherwise or move on faster than our 
fellow-Christians, we cannot help looking back 
with a painful sense of solitude and desertion. 
But our friends in heaven are the more intimately 
associated with us, the farther we are in advance 
of the inert and sluggish. When we seem to be 
alone, we can say as did the prophet, when he 
saw himself environed and guarded by the host 
of heaven, — "They that be with us are more 
than they that be with them." Those of our 
friends who have entered the heavenly rest have 
endured what we must encounter, and know how 
severe are the conflicts through which we must 
struggle into the higher life. They themselves 
felt the loneliness and desolation which sometimes 
press so heavily upon our spirits. Their sensibili- 
ties are now touched to the finest issues. They 
are familiar with every mode of inward experi- 
ence, and can enter into our hearts, where the 
closest sympathy of the living fails us. 



WITH THE LIVING. 345 

Again, we can hardly entertain the idea of the 
communion of our departed friends with us, with- 
out its prompting the desire for their continued 
approbation. Can we bear their inspection, and 
willingly remain unworthy of their esteem ? Can 
we cherish the thought that they are with us, and 
yet harbor principles and habits from which they 
would turn with disapproval and loathing ? Shall 
they behold us clinging to the weights which we 
should lay aside, and hugging the sins which we 
should crucify ? Our friends who have gone 
from us, perhaps, in the weakness of partial affec- 
tion, could see no fault in us. Our parents were, 
it may be, blind to our failings. Our children 
looked up to us with unmingled reverence, as if 
we had been the incarnation of every virtue. 
Our gentle and loving fellow-Christians, while 
they were with us, threw over our weaknesses the 
beautiful mantle of their charity, and read our 
characters through the hazy medium of their own 
kindness. But the scales have now dropped from 
their eyes. -If they see and know us, it is with a 
just appreciation of what we are. And have we 
fallen in their esteem? Do they find us less 
worthy of their love than they used to think us ? 
Do they look upon us as less their companions 
and fellow-disciples than when they were here ? 
As we, parents and children, neighbors and 
friends, hope to find the long lost, but unforgot- 
ten, still true and loving, still and for ever ours, 



346 COMMUNION OP THE DEAD 

0, let us cut off these sources of alienation and 
disappointment on their part, — let us not break 
fellowship with them, by so living in negligence 
and sin, that they must often avert their eyes 
from our unprofitable lives to the eternal throne 
in pitying intercession for us. 

The idea of this discourse appeals with pecu- 
liar power to those who have never entered upon 
the spiritual life. Is there here a son who has a 
mother in heaven ? Had God spared your moth- 
er, my young friend, would you not have held 
her happiness sacred, anticipated her desires, and 
shielded her from disappointment and sorrow? 
You can even now make her happier. Full as 
her joy is, it is not perfect while you remain out 
of the circle of her communion. Your mother's 
soul still yearns for your salvation. Her inter- 
cessions, which first rose over your cradle, now 
ascend for you near the throne Enter on the 
life of heaven, and you hang new jewels on her 
eternal crown of rejoicing. Is there a parent, 
still living without prayer and without the Chris- 
tian's hope, who has committed a child to the 
grave in spotless infancy? How gladly, my 
friend, would you have guarded your child from 
peril and from grief, and borne him in the arms 
of an all-enduring love along the rugged path of 
life ! A work of love yet remains for you in that 
child's behalf. He prays that he may not be left 
an orphan spirit, though it be in heaven ; and for 



WITH THE LIVING. 347 

your first steps in the footmarks of the Lord 
Jesus, the voice, lost to earth before it could say 
My Father or My Mother^ will be lifted in glad 
thanksgiving for you. Brothers and sisters, from 
whose circle Heaven has chosen the pure and 
lovely, were you here united by cordial sympathy 
and deep affection? Their prayer is, that the 
divided household may again be made one. Are 
you the bond-slaves of gain, or pleasure, or self- 
indulgence ? The spirits of the departed mark 
your downward steps, and turn away from the 
scenes of your levity or your guilt in earnest dep- 
recation of the fatal issue to which they see you 
hastening. By a renewed heart and life, you can 
make yet happier those whom God has made hap- 
py, and satisfy the only longing of their souls 
which eternal love has left unfilled. 

Finally, what a momentous interest is given to 
our whole earthly life by the thought that it is 
passed in the presence and communion of the 
great spiritual family ? To my mind there is 
hardly a text of Scripture, or form of speech, 
that rolls on with such a depth and fulness of 
meaning as those words, — " Seeing that we are 
compassed about with so great a cloud of wit- 
nesses." Vast and bewildering is the philosoph- 
ical speculation which tells us that we cannot lift 
a finger without moving the distant spheres. But 
far more grand and unspeakably solemn is the 
thought that our daily lives, our conduct in lowly 



348 COMMUNION OF THE DEAD WITH THE LIVING. 

and sheltered scenes, our speech and walk in the 
retirement of our homes, are felt through the 
universe of ever-living souls, — that the laws of 
attraction and repulsion that reach through all 
orders of being extend to our least words and 
deeds, — that in every worthy, generous, holy 
impulse all heaven bears part, — that from the 
trail of our meanness and selfishness, our way- 
wardness and levity, all heaven recoils. Let the 
august witnesses, the adoring multitude, in whose 
presence we dwell and worship, arouse us to 
growing diligence in duty, and awaken in us in- 
creasing fervor of spirit, that we may run with 
patience the race that is set before us, and, 
found faithful unto death, may receive the crown 
of life. 



SERMON XXYII. 



THE LORD'S SUPPER. 

AS OFTEN AS YE EAT THIS BREAD, AND DRINK THIS CUP, YE 
DO SHOW THE LORD's DEATH TILL HE COME. 1 Corinthl- 

ans xi. 26. 

It is an hour of love. The toils of death are 
spread for the great Teacher. The traitor has 
commenced his plotting. The great council of 
the nation have decreed that Jesus shall die. He 
knows that his hour has come, — that the shep- 
herd is to be smitten, and the sheep scattered. 
Regardless of his own sufferings, but full of ten- 
der solicitude for his disciples, he gathers the 
faithful few around the paschal table, and there 
pours forth over them his love, his counsels, and 
his prayers, in words of the most thrilling pathos, 
which must have made even the traitor's heart 
die within him, and which alone will suffice to 
account for the agony of remorse that seized him, 
when he found his crime committed past recall. 
Not for them alone does Jesus pray ; but for 
those who shall believe on him through their 

30 



350 THE LORD*S SUPPER. 

word. He looks far down the vista of tir^e, and 
far-off generations rise before him. He sees the 
growing ranks of the redeemed from every kin- 
dred and people. For all these is he to bear the 
cross and endnre the shame. For these is- the 
crown of thorns to lacerate his brow, and the 
knotted scourge to tear his flesh. Their sins he 
bears, their griefs he carries on his interceding 
breast. Through him is the voice of pardon to 
reach them, and the peace of God to be shed 
abroad in their souls. How stupendous an inter- 
est hangs around this hour ! He has uttered the 
testament of love, and is going to seal it with his 
blood. It is " a night much to be remembered 
unto all generations." " And it will be remem- 
bered," we may suppose our Saviour inwardly to 
have said. " My disciples in every age will look 
back to this hour, to learn the depth of my hu- 
miliation and the fervor of my love. They will 
revert to these words of mine, when they are 
smitten of God and afflicted. My voice will 
vibrate to the end of time, saying to the tried 
and stricken everywhere. Let not your hearts be 
troubled, — believe in me, — in my father's house 
are many mansions. And now am I to be offered 
up a sacrifice to my own quenchless love. Let 
those for whom I die love me as I have loved 
them. Let them know how sore an anguish 
weighs me down in view of their guilt and woe, 
and how deep their names are engraven on the 



THE lord's supper. 351 

palms of my hands and on my heart; and they 
will, .they must, love me." 

Full of these emotions, with the simplicity of 
true and deep feeling, he seeks no far-fetched 
memorial of the interview, — he institutes no 
pompous ceremony ; but takes the bread and the 
wine before him, breaks and pours them, gives 
them to his disciples, and says, — " Thus do ye 
in remembrance of me. Thus perpetuate this 
hour of love, renew its memory, ponder on its 
hallowed communings. When I have ascended 
on high, and you are treading after me the deep 
vale of humiliation, or the flinty path of the 
world's scorn and hatred, thus recall my love and 
kindle yours. And when you shall preach the 
word of the kingdom from city to city, and gath- 
er here and there a little flock in the name of the 
despised Nazarene, tell them of this festival of 
love, let them in memory of me act over the 
scene, and, as they recall my prayers and coun- 
sels, and muse sadly on my broken body and flow- 
ing blood, break for them the bread and pour the 
cup, as I do now. Thus, when the world has 
grown old, and the time arrives that it should 
pass away, — when I shall stand at the latter day 
upon the earth, not, as now, in the weeds of pov- 
erty and sorrow, but in the glory of the Father 
and his holy angels, — shall I find those here who 
still keep the feast, and show forth their Lord's 
death till he come." 



352 THE lord's supper. 

Such is the request, — such the memorial, — 
the dying wish of our best friend, — of him. who 
suffered for us then, and intercedes for us and 
loves us still. Let us now consider the disposi- 
tions of mind and heart with which it becomes 
us to approach the holy table. 

1. We should come with deep humility. For 
who are we who thus meet to commemorate the 
Saviour ? Most or all of us, I trust, persons who 
have felt something of the power of his death and 
resurrection. But from what experiences of life 
have we come hither ? From homes and from 
paths of duty, in which Jesus has been constantly 
with us ? Or rather, in this holy presence, must 
not confession precede thanksgiving with the most 
faithful of us ? One comes to the altar from an 
active and busy life, in which the love of gain 
has often been the overmastering principle, and 
selfishness has usurped the place of brotherly 
love. Here is another, in the main a careful and 
faithful wife and mother, who yet, when troubled 
about many things, has sometimes forgotten the 
good part, and let worldly cares shut out God 
and heaven from her thoughts. Here is one in 
tlie flush of youth, who at times has loitered over 
long, or transgressed the bounds of Christian so- 
berness, in the pursuit of mere gratification, has 
spurned the yoke of duty wlien its weight was 
felt, and cast away the cross when it began to be 
a burden. Another has left a home, where he 



THE lord's supper. 353 

finds it hard to preserve the raeek and serene as- 
pect in wliich the eyes of the world sustain liim, 
where he often lets forbearance give place to 
wrath, fretfulness cloud his brow, and discontent 
rankle in his heart. Some come from neglected 
family altars ; some from want and misery which 
tliey have known without relieving ; some from 
calls of religious charity to which they have lent 
no ear ; some without an effort, since we last 
met, to hasten the fulfilment of the prayer which 
we always, offer, — " Thy kingdom come." How 
cold and languid has the flow of our devotion 
often been ] How much imperfection, how large 
an admixture of inferior and unworthy motives, 
mingles with our holiest seasons and our best ser- 
vices ! How often does the shadow of self come 
in between our own spirits, and both our brother 
whom we have seen, and our Father whom we 
have not seen ! How various, how heavy, how 
humiliating, the burden, which we, communi- 
cants, bear to the footstool of Divine mercy, when 
we lift our united supplication, and say, — " Fa- 
ther, forgive us, take away our sins, and make 
us all that thou wouldst have us ! " 

AVith all these frailties, we come hither to com- 
mune with one who bore part in our temptations 
and trials, yet knew no sin, — with one for whom 
no sliadow of self ever lay across the path of 
duty, or between liim and the throne of the Most 
High. We come to measure our spirits with 

30* 



354 THE lord's supper. 

liis, — to make his piety and love the standard 
for ours, — to try tlie question, whether we are 
like or unlike him, and, if like him, how nearly 
resembling him, and in what traits still lack- 
ing kindred with him. This self-comparison we 
ought to make, whenever we come to the table 
of the Lord. We should admit him as Judge 
into the recesses of our hearts, and listen witli 
reverence for the sentence that he may pass upon 
us. Did we bow at the altar in conscious lowli- 
ness, — did we, while owning the Sa^dour's love, 
behold in truthful liues our own negligence and 
sin, — did godly sorrow for what we have not 
attained blend with our tlianksgivings over the 
emblematic bread and cup, — did we, making a 
mirror of our Lord's countenance, get the just re- 
flection of our own characters, — as many days as 
these communion seasons lie apart, so many Sab- 
bath-day's journeys on the path to heaven would 
they mark, and each would be a starting-point 
for a yet higlier aim and a yet more vigorous pur- 
suit of treasures incorruptible and eternal. 

2. While we come to the altar with deep self- 
abasement, let us come also with sentiments of 
gratitude to Jesus personally, for what he has 
done and suffered in our behalf. Tliis is not a 
season for general praise, prayer, and meditation, 
or for tlie contemplation of duty, virtue, and 
piety in the abstract. But one image should be 
before our minds, — that of a loving, suffering. 



THE lord's supper. 355 

interceding Redeemer, considered as standing in 
the closest personal relation to us, as the medium 
of God's best gifts, as the friend and benefactor 
of each of us individually. It was with emphasis 
that Jesus said, — '' This do in remembrance of 
me." In other religious services, while we rec- 
ognize him as our Mediator, his and our common 
Father is the direct object of regard. Here, 
though all is to the glory of God the Father, our 
vows and thanksgivings should pause and linger 
on their way to the eternal throne, to retrace the 
steps and rehearse the love of Jesus, and to dwell 
with a prolonged and intense regard on the bene- 
fits of which he has been made the sole agent and 
almoner. 

I love to go back in fancy to those early com- 
munion seasons when the Apostles themselves 
])roke bread from house to house, and when often 
there might not have been one present who had 
not talked witli Jesus, sat at meat with him, and 
received special favors directly from his hand. 
At such a scene there may have frequently met 
Lazarus of Bethany and the widow's son of Xain, 
both " recalled upon earth to testify the powers 
of Heaven," made mortal again to bear witness 
of immortality. Tliere may the maniac of Gad- 
ara and the grateful Samaritan leper have told, 
each in his turn, what great things the Lord had 
done for him. There, too, met the self-made 
maniacs, and the victims of spiritual leprosy, 



356 THE lord's supper. 

whom the good Shepherd had called back from 
their mad wanderings and healed of their infirm- 
ities. And then, as years passed, what inward 
gladness and gratitude must have beamed from 
the countenances of the little children on whom 
the Lord's hands had been laid in blessing, as 
they came forward to join the company of his 
professed disciples ! How must the Master's form 
and face have been all outrayed before the inward 
eye of each and all ! How closely felt must have 
been his spiritual presence with them ! And, as 
each told his own story of the Saviour's compas- 
sion and love for him personally, as they retraced 
one and another of the scenes when they had 
been with him on the lake-side or in the desert, 
and especially when one of the chosen twelve im- 
folded the dread mystery of sorrow and agony on 
the night on which he was betrayed, I can almost 
see the furtive eye turned to the closed door, 
in expectation of his visible appearance among 
them, saying, — " Peace be unto you." 

But are these communion seasons never to be 
repeated, and these dear remembrances never to 
be recalled ? Far from it. They were what ours 
ouglit to be, — seasons of personal remembrance 
and gratitude for the great things that the Lord 
has done for us individually. If we are in our 
true place at the altar, he has done great things 
for us, — greater things than those outward mira- 
cles for which we imagine such heart-swelling 



THE lord's supper. 357 

praises to have gone forth. He has done more 
than to awaken us to a dying life ; he has 
breathed into our souls a life to which there is 
no death. He has done more than to raise us 
from the couch of chronic illness ; some of us, we 
trust, he has cleansed from old iniquities, and re- 
stored our palsied powers and diseased affections 
to health and soundness. He has done more for 
us than to pronounce a blessing on our infant 
heads ; for many of us his blessing rested always 
on our very cradles, his baptism was on our spir- 
its when they first unfolded, his gentle influences 
were shed all around our infancy and childhood, 
and have never for a moment left us, except when 
by our own perverseness we have sliut them out 
or grieved them away. His image blends, or 
ought to blend, with every comfort, hope, and joy. 
There is not a gift of Providence which he does 
not sanctify for our use, not a sorrow in which 
his words of peace are not breathed for us, not a 
cup of consolation or gladness mingled for us by 
the Father, which he does not help fill. 

Now, why did not God rain down righteous- 
ness upon us ? Why, instead of sending his spir- 
itual favors as he does the dew and the sum- 
mer si lower, did he give them to us tlirough the 
hands of a Mediator ? Was it not that he might 
make that Mediator a central object of reverence, 
love, and gratitude, and fix our hearts upon him 
with the warmest devotion, so that, when we 



358 THE lord's supper. 

lifted our thanks to the Father of all, we might 
praise him, not only for his gifts, but even more 
for that chosen Son and elder Brother through 
whom he had bestowed them ? Let us, then, 
prepare at the holy table inwardly to recount our 
Saviour's benefits to us. Ought not each of us 
to be able to make such grateful acknowledg- 
ments as these ? — " This virtue I learned of him 
on the Mount. That sin he rebuked in me, as 
he taught by the Sea of Galilee. This spiritual 
grace I have copied from the living law which he 
held forth. His meekness has made me gentle. 
His prayer for his murderers has taught me to 
forgive. I mourn with hope for my pious kin- 
dred ; for his words at the tomb of Lazarus give 
me peace. I bow with submission under trial, I 
take the bitter cup without repining, I murmur 
not when the cross is laid upon my shoulders ; 
for I have watched with him in Gethsemane, and 
have trodden with him the path to Calvary. 
Death has no terror for me ; for I have seen his 
countenance in dying. Eternity is full of hope 
for me ; for it is lighted by rays from his broken 
sepulchre." 

3. Let us, also, approach the holy table, as a 
place of enlarged communion with the members, 
no less than with the Head, — with all who bear 
the name and breathe the spirit of our Master. 
Not only let there be peace, cordial good-will, 
and intimate sympathy with those of our own 



THE lord's supper. 359 

little flock, but here especially let our hearts go 
forth beyond our own enclosure, and extend a sin- 
cere fellowship to all that love the Lord Jesus, 
under wliatcvcr form or creed they worship. Nor 
let our communion be with those on earth alone. 
Heaven and earth lie, with regard to each other, 
as did the holy place and the holy of holies in 
the old Jewish temple, close together, and yet a 
thick veil between them, which veil Jesus came 
to rend away, and will rend it utterly away in 
the latter days for all who shall dwell upon the 
regenerated earth. If the veil is ever parted 
now, may it not be, ought it not to be, at the festi- 
val of him who is Lord both of the living and the 
dead, — in whom the whole family in heaven and 
on earth is one ? If there is a point of close 
union between the two worlds, must it not be on 
heaven's part, should it not be on ours, at this 
our special meeting-time with him whom the 
Church above and below unite to reverence ? 
Nay, with regard to some, the veil almost visibly 
divides. We can almost see with the bodily eye 
the revered forms, the benignant faces, of those 
fathers and mothers in Israel, who loved this 
sanctuary as the very gate of heaven ; and with 
tliem come back, in lifelike remembrance, many 
who went behind the veil in the full prime of 
usefulness and piety, — many, too, who to mor- 
tal eye faded as the summer flower, but whom 
faith beheld passing from the outer courts to the 



360 THE lord's supper. 

inner sanctuary of their God. Let these com- 
munings witli heaven be cherished as among the 
choicest means of lifting us above grovelling cares 
and petty sorrows, of sustaining us in arduous 
duty and elevated devotion, and making our daily 
conversation, where our best treasures and un- 
fading hopes are, in heaven. 

4. Finally, we should meet at the holy table, 
not only as friends of the Redeemer, but as fel- 
low-workers with him, — as those on whom his 
parting command has rested, and who are pledged 
to sustain his cause and extend his reign upon 
earth. The prayer, " Thy kingdom come," 
should here be offered witli peculiar fervor, and 
with the earnest resolve that it shall come in part 
through our own instrumentality. We here com- 
memorate the great work of redemption ; shall 
not we bear part in it ? We render our thank- 
offering to him whose name was Jesus, — he shall 
save ; shall we not labor with him in the saving 
of souls ? 

I have sometimes thought, from the apathy of 
so many professed Christians to the great work 
of the Saviour and his Church, that the flow of 
their reflections at the altar must be directly the 
opposite of all this, — that many a self-compla- 
cent communicant, with a sunny smile upon his 
countenance, and with a really grateful and be- 
nevolent cast of feeling, yet with a most unclirist- 
like narrowness of spirit, may say to himself, as 



THE lord's supper. 361 

the consecrated elements are distributed, — "How 
mercifully are we surrounded by bulwarks of sal- 
vation and walls of praise ! How kindly are we 
cared for, with the word of truth regularly dis- 
pensed, and the feast of love spread in its due 
season, with no weary length to go that we may 
worship God, with no sacrifice to make for the 
truth's sake, with no form or mode of self-denial, 
in order that we may win Christ and be found in 
him ! All that we have to do is to sit* quietly on 
the favoring tide, and float to heaven." These 
thoughts may pass, and the communicant may 
deem them pious thoughts, and may go away 
imagining that he has had a season of refreshing 
from the Divine presence ; while yet there has 
not been a single outgoing of spirit for a world 
lying in ignorance and sin, not a single purpose 
of effort or of charity in any cause of human 
progress or redemption, not a shadowy idea that 
Christ has established a bond of sacred obligation 
between the well nourished and the hungering 
and thirsting spirit. Brethren, we have not thus 
learned Christ. Let us not, then, in heart and 
in practice receive him thus. By his appoint- 
ment, every disciple is a missionary of his cross, 
bound in some way or form, by prayer, by influ- 
ence, by effort, by the mite or the talent, as God 
shall endow him, to urge on the cause in which 
the Saviour died, and for which he ever lives to 
intercede. Let vows and purposes of faithfulness 

31 



362 THE lord's supper. 

to the work which he has given his Church to do 
mingle with the solemnities of our approaching 
communion season. And may we so eat and 
drink at his table, discerning the Lord's body, 
that the bread may nourish us, and the cup 
strengthen us, for a walk of growing duty, piety, 
and love. 



SEHMON XXYIII 



THE SOUL'S SOLITUDE. 

I HAVE TRODDEN THE WINE-PRESS ALONE ; AND OF THE PEO- 
PLE THERE WAS NONE WITH ME. — Isaiah Ixiii. 3. 

We are solitary more than we are social beings. 
More of our life is hidden from one another than 
is revealed to one another. Much as we can 
communicate, there is more which we can never 
disclose. Intimate as the union of spirits often 
is, they are like trees that interlace their lower 
branches, while each has its own separate root, 
and each its own separate coronal of verdure. 
These bodies keep our souls apart, dwelling in 
their several tabernacles, and looking at one 
another and holding restricted converse from 
behind the curtains of their tents. Especially 
is this the case with those who are leading spir- 
itual lives and aspiring after spiritual excellence. 
In speaking thus, I do not undervalue such com- 
munion as we have ; though, as I shall show 
you, the most precious part of it is not direct. 



364 THE soul's solitude. 

but through common media of intercourse. Yet, 
much as we enjoy the fellowship of those like- 
minded with us, there are chambers of the soul 
which the keenest mortal vision can never pene- 
trate, — secrets of the heart which can never be 
revealed or discovered on earth. Are you not 
all conscious of this ? Is there one of you, who 
feels sure that he thoroughly knows any fellow- 
mortal, or believes himself to be thoroughly 
known by any fellow-mortal? 

Language, — how utterly inadequate to con- 
vey our deepest experiences, our keenest trials, 
our profoundest consolations, our richest joys ! 
Child of earth and of sense, her ministry is per- 
fect only when outward and earthly objects are 
the theme, and grows less and less sufficing as 
she approaches the deep things of God and of 
eternity. The spirit has groanings that cannot 
be uttered, — thoughts which it can revolve in 
silent musing, and pour into the ear of Heaven 
in silent prayer, bvit which in great part elude 
the drapery of words, and refuse to take shape 
in the conventional forms of speech. Language 
is strictly accurate and fully intelligible, only 
when it relates to those material things which 
we can identify and compare by the organs of 
sense. When I speak of a house or a tree, of 
the Sim or the stars, of music or of thunder, I 
describe what must needs be substantially the 
same to other eyes and ears as it is to my own. 



THE soul's solitude. 365 

But when I speak of motive, desire, temptation, 
aspiration, love, peace, I can convey only the 
same sort of conception, not precisely the same 
conception, that is in my own mind. I may con- 
vey more ; I may convey less. The person to 
whom I speak measures my consciousness by his 
own, and how widely apart these may be neither 
he nor I can tell. And then how frequently is 
thought forced into the very mode of utterance 
most unlike itself! Thus the most frigid words 
proceed as often from the profoundest emotion, 
as from a superficial and passionless nature. We 
are so painfully conscious of feeling more than 
we can express, as to utter very much less than 
we miglit say. Thus some of the warmest hearts 
are among the most reserved, and those who the 
most earnestly long for sympathy frequently ob- 
tain the least of it 

In temptation and in spiritual conflict, we must 
tread the wine-press alone. No human eye can 
behold the embattled hosts of passions and affec- 
tions, of tl>e thoughts that grovel and the thoughts 
that climb, of the earth-spirit with its evil angels 
and the spirit of the Father with tlie powers of 
the world to come. The warfare is within. 
Voices of encouragement may help us. The in- 
tercessions of those who love us may make our 
prayer flow with a freer current. But, after all, 
the brunt of the battle we must sustain alone, 
and in the momentous decisions on which de- 
al * 



366 THE soul's solitude. 

pends our fall or our rising as spiritual beings 
no man can give an answer for his neighbor. 

In our trials and griefs we mjist tread the 
wine-press alone. There are indeed portions of 
every sorrow that are common with others, and 
in these we court sympathy, and it gives us 
comfort. Widow can condole with widow ; the 
bereaved parent is solaced by communion with 
those who have passed through similar afflic- 
tion ; the infirm and suffering rejoice in the con- 
verse of those who have borne burdens like their 
own. But in every deep grief there is some 
profounder depth, which only he who bears it 
has sounded or can sound. There is a limit be- 
yond which fellow-feeling cannot pass. In every 
bereavement there are wounded some of those 
peculiar chords of tender feeling, which we can 
trace in no other heart, and no one else can dis- 
cern in ours. There is a portion of our burden 
which we cannot impart. There are lacerated 
sensibilities which we cannot describe. There 
are painful reflections, regretful remembrances, 
burningly distinct to our own souls, to which we 
know not how to give utterance. 

In the responsibilities of life we must tread the 
wine-press alone. The precise measure of each 
one's stewardship, the adjustment of his conflict- 
ing obligations, the right balance of mutually lim- 
ited duties, the due proportions of activity in this 
and in that direction, — these depend on circum- 



THE soul's solitude. 367 

stances which the individual alone can fully know. 
Fundamental principles may indeed be expound- 
ed and urged by others. The great heads of ob- 
ligation may be enforced with persuasive power 
by the pulpit or the press. Religious counsel 
or exhortation may awaken the slumbering con- 
science, and stimulate to vigorous action the 
dormant powers of the moral nature. But when 
all this is done, there are many questions of de- 
tail — those too of the most solemn import — 
which no man can answer for another, and in 
which he who yields passively to the best advice, 
to the most importunate appeal, to the purest ex- 
ample short of the all-perfect, may be false to 
his trust and to his own soul. Duty is in the 
last resort to be determined by the individual 
conscience, and to his own Master must each one 
stand or fall. 

In the hour of death, of judgment, and of ret- 
ribution, we must tread the wine-press alone. 
In its own strength or weakness, unclothed or 
clothed in its own Christ-bought robe of peni- 
tence and piety, must the soul wage the fearful 
conflict with the last enemy. The prayer of faith 
may indeed go up by the deathbed ; but only the 
prayer of the dying soul can bring down the min- 
istry of angels and the peace of God. And who 
shall stand as his brother's advocate before the 
Judge of the living and the dead ? How solemn 
the thought of that first interview of the disem- 



368 THE soul's solitude. 

bodied spirit with its Father, — no human char- 
ity at hand to cover the sins it cannot heal ; no 
faulty examples or imperfect standards to justify 
its shortcomings ; no surrounding circle of the 
equally frail and erring to drown the conscious- 
ness of its frailties and to palliate its errors ! 
Alone with God, — unveiled, self-knowing, the 
depths of memory and of consciousness broken 
up, the secrets of the heart laid open, — - thus 
must we meet the omniscient eye, and receive 
the sentence which consigns us to the company 
of kindred spirits, to the kingdom prepared for 
us, to joy unspeakable or to unknown woe. 

Thus must we, in our most momentous ex- 
periences, living and dying, tread the wine-press 
alone, and of the people, nay, of the dearest and 
best beloved, there can be none with us. What 
are the appointed resources for this spiritual 
loneliness ? 

In the first place, there is, or ought to be, 
a reality in Christian fellowship, as bringing 
human hearts into more intimate union than 
can subsist through any other agency. Our di- 
rect knowledge of one another and communi- 
cation with one another are, as I have said, 
greatly restricted by the essential poverty and 
inadequacy of language. We need a mediator, 
not only between man and God, but between 
man and man ; and in the latter office no less 
than in the former, Christ stands to his disciples. 



THE soul's solitude. 369 

We are one in him. Our fellowship is with liim, 
and through him with one another. He is the 
common standard and measure of spirit and char- 
acter for his followers. So far as we are united 
with him, we are conscious of possessing the same 
spirit ; the same life-tide throbs in our hearts ; 
the same aspirations go forth ; the same inward 
peace, gladness, and strength settle down upon 
our souls. He is absolute goodness, — not only 
the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever, but 
the same in his moral lineaments to you and 
to me, to men of diverse nations, unlike forms, 
and conflicting creeds ; and by conversance with 
the beauty of holiness in him, we may learn to 
trace, with clear recognition and cordial sympa- 
thy, the Christian elements — the " Christ-side," 
if I may so speak — of every character. 

Thus your temptations may be widely unlike 
mine, and neither could convey to the other the 
map of his battle-ground or the history of his 
conflicts ; but of the principles through which 
we have overcome, of tlie helping spirit from 
the Father which has made its strength perfect 
in our weakness, of the Divine Form which has 
preceded us as the Captain of our salvation, we 
can freely commune, and hardly need words to 
make our communion perfect, so fully conscious 
are we of the identity of the Saviour's part in 
the experience of both. Our trials and our griefs 
too have much that we cannot impart; but the 



370 THE soul's solitude. 

consolations of the Gospel, the words of peace, 
the promises of Christ, the spirit of implicit trust 
and serene resignation, the " one like unto the 
Son of Man " that is with iis in the furnace sev- 
en times heated, — these are the same to every 
Christian heart, the tokens of that presence 
which is without variableness or shadow of turn- 
ing. Thus, also, we may not fully enter into one 
another's position and circumstances, so as to an- 
swer one for another those delicate questions of 
duty in which the Christian must take chief or 
sole counsel of his conscience and his God ; but 
we can fully sympathize in the loyalty to our 
common Master, which sustains us on our sepa- 
rate paths, and gives a harmony of purpose and 
action to all the various forms and aspects of 
Christian obedience. 

The term "Christian" has for all whose ex- 
perience has helped them to define it a fixed and 
absolute meaning, and so far as we realize its 
meaning in our own souls, we know what it 
means in every other soul and life. Thus is it 
that, with no other bond and with everything 
else dissimilar, the sincere followers of Christ can 
easily enter into the most intimate relations, and 
can know more of each other in an hour than 
if they stood side by side for a lifetime on any 
worldly arena. Thus, in those great emergen- 
cies of trial, grief, and arduous duty, when or- 
dinary sympatliy becomes distant and the closest 



THE soul's solitude. 371 

associates seem to move as in an outer circle, 
Christian may approach Christian, though they 
never saw each other's face before, may converse 
in a known language, and from heart to heart 
may flow the consolations that are in Christ Je- 
sus, the breathings of the hope full of immortality, 
the emanations of a peace which the world can- 
not give. And in the last conflict, when kindred 
that are not kindred in Christ must leave the 
soul alone, and must feel that intercourse has 
ceased though consciousness still remains, the 
Christian can go down with his fellow-Christian 
to the margin of the stream that divides the un- 
seen world from this, and can know the joy that 
fills his heart, the communion with heaven that 
looses for him the pains of death, the glad vis- 
ions of eternity that play before his departing 
spirit, the voice of " God that justifieth" calling 
him from the outer courts of the Father's house 
into the holy of holies. 

We have also direct communion with Christ. 
We rely on his word, " Lo, I am with you al- 
ways." Tempted as we have been, touched with 
the feeling of our infirmities, our brother in trial 
and in grief, our forerunner through the shadow 
of death and the darkness of the grave, he can 
enter into our every experience, into the depths 
of our inmost consciousness, and we can feel as- 
sured of his entire sympathy in thoughts too pro- 
found for utterance, in conflicts which have no 



372 THE soul's solitude. 

human witness, in our peculiar and incommuni- 
cable griefs, in doubts and fears which the near- 
est earthly friend knows not and can never know. 
0, it is a thought rich in comfort and encourage- 
ment that he is thus with us, — that the fellow- 
feeling which we can fully realize in no human 
friend is with him entire and intimate, so that 
there is for us no unshared burden, no undivid- 
ed sorrow, no worthy desire which he proffers 
not for and with us, no fervent prayer which is 
not upborne and seconded by him who " ever liv- 
eth to make intercession for us." 

Among the many uses of our Saviour's incar- 
nation, — among the many reasons why God has 
ordained that his richest spiritual favors shall flow 
to us not directly from himself, but through a 
Mediator in human form, — we cannot attach an 
unduly high importance to this provision for the 
spiritual solitude in which we are often left, so 
far as man is concerned. It is not a mere fan- 
cy, but a blessed experience, as I trust many of 
you can bear witness with me. In arduous and 
thankless duty, has it not seemed to us as if Jesus 
were treading the wine-press with us, and were 
saying in our inward ear, " Be thou faithful unto 
death, — be thou of good cheer ; for I have over- 
come the world " ? When the lives of those dear 
both to us and to him have trembled on the 
verge of deatli, has there not been that in our 
hearts which corresponded to the message sent 



THE soul's solitude. 373 

by the sisters of Bethany, — " Lord, behold, he 
whom thou lovest is sick " ? Has it not been an 
unspeakable consolation to us, that he, whom dis- 
eases obeyed, is no less near to mortal homes and 
hearts than in the days of his flesh, and, though 
he may not as then speak the healing word, that 
he can impart to the dying and the living peace 
not as the world gives ? In the death of those 
whom the Lord loves, can we divest ourselves, 
or would we if we could, of the simple, beautiful 
faitli of the hymn, — 

" 'T is but the voice that Jesus sends, 
To call them to his arras " ? 

When we look forward to our own death, is it on 
the abstract truths of religion that we rely ; or is 
it not rather on the personal presence and sym- 
pathy of our Redeemer, and are not our dearest 
hopes expressed when we can say to the Good 
Shepherd, " Though I pass through the valley 
of the shadow of death, 1 will fear no evil, for 
thou art with me " ? 

Again, we are not alone ; for the Father is with 
us. He has restricted our fellowship with man, 
that we may seek the closer communion with 
him. He has ordained that we should be alone, 
that we may be alone with him. Prayer, though 
cherished by utterance, needs not words, nor even 
the capacity of utterance, but may often be most 
fervent when we know not what to pray for as 
we ought. The spirit of adoption — the cry, 

32 



374 THE soul's solitude. 

"Abba, Father," as it trembles in the heart — 
is in itself a perpetual prayer. It is prayer, when 
we are profoundly conscious that God is more 
closely conversant with our spirits than we our- 
selves are, though we can only say, — " Lord, 
thou knowest all things ; thou knowest that 
I love thee." What an unspeakable relief is 
it, — when we are misapprehended by others, 
when our attainments fall short of our aspira- 
tions, when diffidence represses the utterances 
of which the heart is full, when we can let no 
mortal friend into our deepest emotions and our 
warmest desires, when we are alone in conflict 
or in sorrow, — in those crises of the inward 
nature which no human sympathy can reach or 
human help avail, — to feel that Grod sees us as 
we are, that the darkness which veils our spirits 
from mortal sight hides them not from him to 
whom the night shineth as the day ! Let tliis 
then be our constant resort in the loneliness of 
the soul. Let us rejoice that to him are our 
hearts known, our desires open, and no secret 
thing hidden ; and let the consciousness that he 
is thus with us make the words of our lips and 
the meditations of our hearts always acceptable 
in his sight. 

Finally, this solitude of the spirit directs our 
thoughts and hopes to the sphere of being where 
we shall fully know and be fully known, where 
the separating wall of the body shall fall away, 



THE soul's solitude. 375 

soul spring to soul, and heart unite with heart. 
We cannot but believe that closer society, more 
intimate union than we can enjoy here, is reserved 
for us in heaven, — that there will be a blending 
of spirit with spirit of wliich the present laws of 
intercourse are but an imperfect type and a vague 
shadow. This is one of the visions of the future 
life which is adapted to give richer zest to our 
hope of reunion in heaven with those whom we 
love best on earth. How have we often longed 
for a deeper insight into the souls of those who 
have been our exemplars and guides in duty, 
who have here breathed the most of the spirit 
of heaven ! When we have drawn close the 
bonds of our communion, how have we desired 
that they might be closer still, — that there 
might be a fuller interchange of sentiment and 
feeling than could be borne from heart to heart 
by lip or look ! Of the mode of spiritual inter- 
course we can indeed form no clear conception. 
This only we know, — that from the Divine Spirit 
there are thoughts communicated to our minds, 
impressions borne in upon our souls, without 
voice, or sound, or any of the outward machin- 
ery of intercourse. Why may not spirit, in the 
future, commune with spirit, as the Father of 
our spirits now communes with us all ? Why 
may not each spiritual presence be, as it were, 
translucent to every other, and sentiment, af- 
fection, adoration, be transfused, as it is even 



376 THE soul's solitude. 

now in our best and happiest moments from the 
pressure of the hand, the quivering of the Up, 
the glow of the countenance ? However this 
may be, there can be no division-walls in the 
heavenly household, — there must be there un- 
restricted converse, perfect mutual knowledge, 
society so close that spirit shall answer to spirit 
as face to face does now. 

Shall not this hope bring us into nearer and 
happier fellowship even here ? Shall not our 
communings be such as we shall delight to re- 
new and prolong in heaven ? 0, while we must 
tread the wine-press alone, let us aspire after the 
closer communion that pervades the ranks of the 
redeemed. In our households, let our converse 
be not only of the things that change and per- 
ish, but of those things which the angels desire 
to look into. As fellow-disciples let hand join 
hand, and heart draw nigh to heart, as we move 
on in our Christ-marked way. Let the chosen, 
dearest themes of our converse be those which 
we shall rejoice to recall in the New Jerusalem, 
in the assembly of the redeemed, among the ador- 
ing hosts near the eternal throne. 



SERMON XXIX. 



HOPE THE SOUL'S ANCHOR. 

WHICH HOPE WE HAVE AS AN ANCHOR OF THE SOUL, BOTH 
SURE AND STEADFAST, AND WHICH ENTERETH INTO THAT 

WITHIN THE VEIL. — Hcbrcws vi. 19. 

This comparison of hope with an anchor is op- 
posed to common modes of thought and expres- 
sion. The more natural figure to most minds 
would be that of a buoy. I apprehend that, 
where that of the anchor is employed, in nine 
cases out of ten it is quoted from the Bible with- 
out any definite meaning. Yet I do not believe 
that it was used at haphazard in our text ; but it 
seems to me one of the numerous cases in which 
a profound wealth of spiritual significance is 
condensed into a single word of Scripture. All 
hope is not anclior-like ; or, if it be, there are 
many hopes which are anchors with cables too 
short to reach the bottom, and which therefore 
only expose the vessel to quicker, more irregular, 
and more violent pitches and plunges in the 
storm-lifted deep. 

32* 



378 HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 

Following out our figure with regard to world- 
ly affairs, we can easily see that the length of the 
cable makes a surprising difference. The strong 
hope of some gratification of to-morrow unsettles 
to-day's life, unfits us for to-day's duty, and sus- 
tains a feverish excitement, under which time is 
wasted, obligation violated, and even principle 
endangered. The approaching holiday crazes 
the schoolboy, and the teacher must expect only 
slighted tasks and incessant mischief till the holi- 
day is over. The near prospect of intense but 
evanescent joy is hardly less a disturbing force to 
the else contented and industrious adult, whose 
continuous toil thus becomes spasmodic, while his 
usually sober habits of thought lapse into reverie. 
But a distant hope has a very different effect. 
The boy who hopes at some future time to sup- 
port his impoverished parents ; the youth who 
hopes for a good name and a fair place in his 
chosen profession ; the man who hopes for com- 
petence and honor, which he can win only by 
patient effort, — all these find hope an availing 
anchor. It moors them ; it steadies them against 
breeze and current, gale and storm ; it keeps them 
from temptation, and delivers them from evil. 

The anchor needs a length of cable sufficient, 
but not too great ; adequate weight ; and the ad- 
justment of stock, shankj and flukes, which will 
most effectually hold the ship to her moorings. 
These characteristics applied to spiritual things 



HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 379 

would give us adequate remoteness, vastness, and 
certainty as the requisite properties of a hope that 
shall be an anchor to the soul. 

I. Adequate remoteness. Remote in point of 
time we cannot, indeed, pronounce the objects of 
the Ciiristian hope ; for there may be at any mo- 
ment but a step between us and death. Yet the 
due effect of distance is produced, in part by the 
indefiniteness of our term of life here, and in 
part by our imperfect knowledge of the details 
of our future condition. Did we know that 
our lives would be greatly prolonged on the 
earth, our anchor would then have indeed a 
superfluous length of cable, and we should be 
tempted to give unrestrained scope to the en- 
joyments of the passing day, and to postpone till 
the last few years or months the work which 
belongs to all our time, and is the easier and 
more entire the earlier it is begun. On the other 
hand, did we know the day of our death to be 
very near, the cable of our anchor would be in- 
juriously shortened, — the prospect would im- 
pair our active powers, derange our plans both 
of self-improvement and of social duty, and trans- 
fer us from the list of workers to that of anxious 
expectants. So, too, had we the same clear con- 
ception of the life of heaven which we have of 
approaching seasons of earthly festivity and glad- 
ness, the view would be so overpoweringly grand 
and attractive as to throw all temporal interests 



380 HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 

and enjoyments into undne insignificance, to make 
US impatient for the time of our departure, and 
discontented under the yoke of daily duty. But 
now the uncertainty that rests on the closing 
hour is adapted to make us diligent without im- 
patience, to help us use the world without abus- 
ing it, to keep the field of duty and discipline 
fully open for us, without inspiring disgust, wea- 
riness, or inordinate longing for a change. At 
the same time, just enough of the unseen future 
is revealed to feed desire, without casting too 
deep a shadow on earthly good, to make us will- 
ing to depart, and yet willing to await God's time 
and way for our removal. The hopeful Christian 
sees heaven near enough to furnish every possi- 
ble motive for virtue, fidelity, and spiritual affec- 
tions, yet not near enough to detach him from 
the relations in which God would have him con- 
scientiously faithful, — from the field of duty of 
which the Master says, " Occupy till I come." 

II. Our Christian anchor is of sufficient weight. 
The prospect of heaven, though indefinite, is vast. 
Though a veil hangs before the glory and joy to 
be revealed, it is a semi-transparent veil, through 
which we get grand and gorgeous glimpses of the 
celestial city. What an unspeakable amount of 
happiness is proffered us here, in the crowded god- 
sends of a benignant Providence, compassing our 
path and our lying down, poured out with unstint- 
ed hand on all our ways, — in the kindly course 



HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 381 

and beautiful harmony of nature, — in our homes, 
and in those genial relations with our fellow-be- 
ings by which blessings are multiplied because 
divided, magnified because shared ! Yet, with 
the full perception of all that can here minister 
to our joy, it is a far more exceeding and eternal 
weiglit of glory that lies before us. The earth- 
ly fades when brought into comparison with the 
heavenly. Time presents no attractions that can 
vie with the promises of eternity. Our concep- 
tions of heaven are enough to more than fill the 
soul with their fulness, and to outshine all things 
else by their divine radiance. The imagery of 
the New Testament carries fancy on to its utmost 
limits, and up till its pinions can soar no higher. 
In these boundless and infinite prospects, we have 
more tlian a counterpoise for whatever might be- 
guile our souls from their high calling and des- 
tiny. 

III. Our Christian anchor has its firm hold of 
certain and immovable evidence. Little as we 
know where or what heaven is, no law of our be- 
ing is made more sure to us than our immortality. 
Its evidence is not intuition, surmise, specula- 
tion, or longing, but fact which cannot be gain- 
said, unless we pronounce the whole past a dream 
and all history a fable. We have the same proof 
that the dead have risen, which we have that 
countless multitudes have sunk into the death- 
slumber. The resurrection of Christ is not even 



382 HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. - 

an isolated fact of anthentic history, but a fact 
which has left surer traces of its reality, deeper 
channels of its influence, than any other event 
that has occurred since the creation of man. 
It was the initial cause, and the only possible 
cause, of a series of events and experiences that 
have been developing themselves for eighteen 
hundred years. There is no ground on which 
we believe anything beyond the range of our 
senses, on which the whole Gospel history, with 
Christ's resurrection for its culminating incident, 
does not commend itself to belief. Thus, do we 
receive human testimony ? Here we have its 
blended and manifold voices. Do effects indi- 
cate a cause ? Here we have numberless and 
vast effects, which were all uncaused unless the 
Gospel narrative be true. Is the consenting voice 
of large and varied experience a valid ground of 
argument ? What a cloud of witnesses have we 
here to the reality of every spiritual phenome- 
non that should result from the fact of a resur- 
rection and the demonstrated certainty of the life 
to come ! Is the Author of our being competent 
to attest its laws and its destiny ? If so, what 
conceivable testimony other than miracle could 
he bear, and how could that attestation be clear- 
er and stronger than he has made it in the 
Gospel ? 

In thus laying intense stress on the historical 
argument, I forget not the intimations of im- 



^HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 383 

mortalitj, the hopeful analogies, the onward point- 
ings, of which nature and life are full. When 
Nature wakes from her wintry slumber, and the 
life-current throbs anew in the withered trees, 
and field and forest resume their robes of praise, 
we revisit the mounds in the graveyard with a 
renewed glow of hope. In the outblooming of 
the world around us, we feel a more elastic as- 
surance that the blighted blossoms of our homes 
and hearts bloom in celestial gardens. But when 
in autumn all looks worn and faded, a troop of 
mournful associations and sad analogies come 
thronging into the mind again ; the soul that re- 
lies on the teachings of Nature yields to the sur- 
rounding gloom ; and the snow that falls upon 
the late green graves falls with deadening weight 
upon the hope of man. But the spring flowers 
that bloom around the sepulchre of Jesus never 
wither. 

Again, there are times when our souls seem 
almost conscious of immortality, spring forth in- 
to a higher sphere, behold their celestial birth- 
right, and read the words of eternal life in capaci- 
ties which they have no room to develop here, 
in longings which earth cannot satisfy, in aspi- 
rations that transcend all created good. But 
weariness, care, or sorrow comes ; and then the 
wings of the spirit droop, its heaven is clouded 
over, and to him who depends on his own clear 
intuition all looks dark and desolate. But the 



384 HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 

Christian thus bowed down stoops to look into 
the place where the Lord lay, hears the voice of 
the resurrection angel, and sees, through a cleft 
in the clouds, the shining path of the ascending 
Redeemer. 

No one can recognize more cordially than I 
would the correspondences between the outward 
and the spiritual world, — the Scriptures old as 
the creation, on which God has inscribed images 
and symbols of the yery same truths that he has 
revealed in the written word. To my eye, the 
law of man's immortality is typified in the wheat- 
sheaf springing from the dry and shrunken ker- 
nel, in the butterfly soaring aloft from the tomb 
which the earth-worm had spun, in the tendency, 
through all departments of nature, of lower forms 
of life to merge themselves in higher. I would 
own, too, with the warmest gratitude, those ele- 
ments of our spiritual nature, which, confined 
and crippled here, like the germ in the un- 
planted seed, claim a more genial soil, a more 
propitious sky, for their full development. But 
I always find that these views come the most 
readily to my mind when it is free, unburdened, 
and happy. Under the pressure of bereavement 
or despondency, like summer friends, they vanish, 
or linger at the threshold, cold and ujigenial com- 
forters. It is then that we need to see immor- 
tality revealed, the eternal life made manifest; 
and more would I prize in the season of need a 



HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 385 

single realizing glimpse of the scene at the gate 
of Nain or the tomb of Lazarus, or a single glance 
of implicit faith at the forsaken sepulchre of Jesus, 
than all sources of belief from beyond the Gospel 
record, were they brought to one fountain-head, 
and poured over my spirit in their fullest flow. 

We have, then, a hope fitted to be an anchor of 
the soul, and we need it to give us stability equal- 
ly among the temptations, the duties, and the tri- 
als of life. 

1. Among its temptations. How close their 
pressure ! How intense their disturbing force ! 
Like the swell of a storm-lifted ocean, they break 
upon our youth, dash against the strength of our 
maturer years, and burst over the hoary head. 
Appetite and passion, pride and gain, ease and 
indolence, how do they essay by turns their sin- 
gle and their combined power upon every soul of 
man ! How do they toss and dash from breaker 
to breaker, and from shallow to shallow, every 
unanchored spirit ! And their hold upon us is as 
unanchored spirits, — through our intense desire 
of immediate gratification and our detachment 
from the unseen future. Their talisman is the 
infidel's creed ; their watchword, " Immortality 
is a dream." They get influence over us solely 
by shaking our conviction, or drowning our con- 
sciousness, of a life beyond tlie present. They 
assail us, not as children of God and heirs of 
immortality, but as offspring of the dust and vic- 

33 



386 HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 

tims of the grave. And did I believe myself so, 
I would seize the nearest and the cheapest pleas- 
ures. I would crown myself with rosebuds be- 
fore they were withered, and let no flower of the 
spring pass by me. I would never face opposi- 
tion, or gird myself for self-denying duty. The 
utmost . calculation that I would make would be 
as to the greatest amount of pleasurable sensa- 
tion that could be crowded into the probable pe- 
riod of my life on earth. But let me only behold 
in faith my risen Saviour, and hear from him 
those divine words, " Because I live, ye shall 
live also," then I can cast away the withering 
wreath from the earthly vine for the amaranthine 
crown. I can dash from me the cup of sensual 
gratification, for the water which I may drink, 
and thirst no more for ever. I can tread the 
rough and steep path, while at every step the ce- 
lestial city rises clearer and brighter to my view. 
I can throw the whole energy of an immortal being 
into the defiant mandate, — " Tempter, depart ; 
get thee behind me, Satan." 

2. But we no less need this anchor when we 
have escaped the temptations which assail the 
lower nature, and find ourselves on the shoreless 
sea of duty. Here again the waves lift up their 
voice. How vast the extent, how complex the 
demands, how imperative' the claims, how ear- 
nest the calls, of spiritual obligation! How 
liable we are, even with a quick and tender con- 



HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 387 

science, to let some of these voices drown others, 
— to select our easy or our favorite departments 
of duty, instead of aiming at entire fidelity, — to 
let waywardness modify principle, and conven- 
ience limit obligation ! How does the random, 
erratic course of many who mean to do right and 
well, resemble that of a ship driven by the wind 
and tossed on the billows ! And here our anchor 
comes into use, to keep us in the moorings where 
God lias placed us. It is earthly breezes — hu- 
man opinion, fear, and favor — that sway us hith- 
er and thither. The consciousness of our im- 
mortality alone can make us firm and resolute, 
with every real demand of duty before us in its 
relative claims and just proportions, with tlie 
work given us to do present to the inward vision, 
and with the whole power of the world to come 
making its strength perfect in our weakness. 

There is, in this view, a wonderful impressive- 
ness in the close of the fifteenth chapter of St. 
Paul's First Epistle to the Corinthians. The 
whole theme of the chapter is the resurrection 
and the life to come. The corner-stone of the 
Apostle's reasoning is the great stone which the 
angel rolled away from the Saviour's sepulchre, 
— " If Christ be not risen, our preaching is vain, 
and your faith is also vain." From this, he as- 
cends step by step to the contemplation of the 
still distant day when he, who conquered, shall 
destroy death, and " all things shall be put un- 



388 HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 

der his feet." He rebuts by unanswerable anal- 
ogies the scepticism of those who ask, " How 
are the dead raised up, and with what body do 
they come ? " He shows us the corruptible put- 
ting on incorruption, the mortal clothing itself in 
immortality. Then, as if for himself the change 
were already passed, and heaven won, he breaks 
forth into the shout of eternal triumph, — "0 
death, where is thy sting ? grave, where is 
thy victory ? " And now comes the climax 
in the calm, deliberate exhortation, — " Where- 
fore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast^ un- 
movable, always abounding in the work of the 
Lord, forasmuch as ye know that your labor is 
not in vain in the Lord." Thus does the great 
Apostle forge, as it were among the lightnings 
that play before the sapphire throne, the anchor 
to be dropped down into the sea of conflicting 
interests, opinions, and passions, to hold the in- 
dividual soul to its divinely appointed roadstead 
of duty. 

3. We need our anchor among the trials and 
sorrows which are the lot of all. However calm- 
ly the sea of life may roll for a while, there are 
times when the waves and the billows go over us, 
and the floods lift up their voices around us, — 
times when, if in this life only we have hope, we 
are ready to pronounce ourselves of all men the 
most miserable. When the gains of a lifetime 
are swept away in an hour, and a prime spent in 



HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 389 

affluence sinks into a needy old age ; when, ago- 
nized by violent disease, we pass at once from vig- 
orous health into the very jaws of death, or, crip- 
pled by clironic infirmity, we drag our limbs after 
us as a prisoner his chain ; when the light of our 
eyes is quenched, and the voices that made sweet 
melody in our hearts are silent in the grave ; 
when, as with not a few among iis, our dead out- 
number our living, and the monuments in the 
cemetery are more than the olive-plants around 
our table, — we then have encountered griefs be- 
yond the reach of human comforters. They set 
adrift the soul that has no hold on heaven. They 
abandon it to empty regrets, fruitless complain- 
ings, — often to a despondency which can find 
relief only in the self-forgetfulness of sensual in- 
dulgence. They are, in an earthly point of view, 
intense and unmitigated evils. Yet, with the an- 
chor of an immortal hope, how serenely may the 
Christian outride these storms, and at the very 
acme of their violence hear the voice which ever 
says to the winds and to the waves, " Peace ! be 
still ! " How does the great thought, the swell- 
ing, bounding hope of immortality belittle earth- 
ly trials, so that, when it fills our souls, we can 
borrow the Apostle's words, and pronounce our 
sorrows " light " and " but for a moment," and 
" not worthy to be compared with the glory 
that shall be revealed " ! For what is loss, what 
is penury, if the soul have its wealth, boundless, 

S3* 



390 HOPE THE soul's ANCHOR. 

infinite, eternal ? What is bodily pain or infirm- 
ity, if there be within the health and soundness 
which the Divine Physician guarantees as the 
pledge of everlasting life ? And what are these 
partings on the brief voyage ? — severe indeed, I 
know from repeated experience, yet not for a sin- 
gle moment hopeless or despairing, when we can 
yield up the dying to the covenant love of our 
risen Redeemer, and feel assured that we shall 
meet them again in the ranks of the ransomed, 
and renew the worship of the home altar in the 
redemption song of the Father's house on high. 
how blessed the anchor, " which entereth into 
that within the veil, whither," adds our context, 
" the Forerunner is for us entered, even Jesus," 
— whither so many of the beloved have passed 
on before us, and await our coming ! 

" There, in the soft and beautifal belief 
Flows the true Lethe for the lips of Grief ; 
There Penury, Hunger, Misery, cast their eyes, 
How soon the bright republic of the skies ! 
There Love, heart-broken, sees prepared the bower, 
And hears the bridal step, and waits the nuptial hour ! 
There smiles the mother we have wept ! There bloom 
Again the buds asleep within the tomb. 
There, o'er bright gates inscribed, No more to part. 
Soul springs to soul, and heart unites to heart ! " 



SERMON XXX 



THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 

WHEREFORE, SEEING WE ALSO ARE COMPASSED ABOUT WITH 
SO GREAT A CLOUD OF WITNESSES, LET US LAY ASIDE EVERY 
WEIGHT, AXD THE SIN WHICH DOTH SO EASILY BESET US, 
AND LET US RUN WITH PATIENCE THE RACE THAT IS SET 

BEFORE US. — Hebrews xii. 1. 

The author of this Epistle had in his mind the 
games, or contests of speed and strength, which 
were the most august occasions, and convened 
the most illustrious and brilliant assemblies, in 
all classic antiquity. The athlete who ran on the 
Olympic course had been for months training him- 
self for the trial, — had abstained not only from 
guilty, but from innocent indulgence, — had 
sought by the most rigid regimen and the most 
vigorous exercise to lay aside every weight, that 
is, all superfluous heaviness of the flesh, and to 
reduce himself to that precise degree of thinness 
which combines strength with activity, lightness 
and elasticity of limb with full muscular develop- 
ment and tension. And the day of his race was 



392 THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 

the most eventful day of his life. He ran in an 
area, around which stood all the great men of 
Greece and her colonies, and not unfrequentlj 
crowned and laurelled heads from foreign and 
distant lands. There were poets ready to em- 
balm the victor's name in immortal verse. There 
were artists who would transmit his form and 
features to far-off generations. It was indeed the 
highest honor that the world had to bestow ; and 
those who had won the first place in empire or 
in arms deemed the summit of glory unattained 
while the Olympic wreath was wanting. 

It is unfortunate that our text, in the arbitrary 
arrangement which you know is a device of mod- 
ern times, stands at the beginning of a chapter. 
It belongs to the preceding chapter In that the 
writer gives a long list, from Abel downward, of 
those whose faith had made them dear to God, 
and won for them an inheritance among the just 
made perfect At first he goes into detail, and 
describes the peculiar forms of trial and modes of 
fidelity of those whom he commemorates. Then, 
as one after another crowds upon his memory, he 
gives simply the names of Gideon, Barak, Sam- 
son, Jephthah, David, and Samuel. Then, as the 
very names oppress him with their multitude, he 
suspends the catalogue, and enumerates the vari- 
ous suiferings and conflicts in which a number 
beyond thought of devout men and holy women 
had obtained a good report through faith, and re- 



THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 393 

ceived the promises. And now he sees the world 
transformed into a race-ground. Christians are 
running for the prize. These illustrious dead, 
each decked with the crown of victory, are the 
dense cloud of witnesses, watching the conflict 
with intense interest, urging the laggards, cheer- 
ing on those who are rapidly nearing the goal, 
shouting their plaudit ^ whenever the goal is 
reached and the laurel wreath is twined around 
the victor's brow. " Seeing, then," says our 
writer, " that we are on the race of life, with the 
amaranthine crown for our prize, and encircled 
by all who in every age have won the victory, 
have reached the STimmit of spiritual glory, have 
their name written on records more durable than 
brass or adamant, let us lay aside every weight, 
every desire, love, propensity, or habit tliat can 
make us loiter on the race-course, especially our 
constitutional or besetting faults, — those sins to 
which we are the most inclined, and for which 
we find the readiest apology; and thus unencum- 
bered, in fidl strength, with every power and af- 
fection concentrated on the goal and the prize, 
let us run with perseverance the race that is set 
before us." 

This idea of the presence of the departed, and 
their surviving interest in the scenes among 
which their trophies were won, is a familiar one 
with the sacred writers, though nowhere else ex-- 
hibited with the scenic effect with which it is here 



394 THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 

placed before the imagination. What a glorious 
and inspiring thought, that we are acting our 
parts, fulfilling our mission, beneath the loving 
and solicitous regards — when faithful, under the 
approving eye — of patriarchs, prophets, and apos- 
tles, — of Abel, the first mortal who put on 
immortality, — of Abraham, the father of the 
faithful, — of Moses, the mediator of that early 
covenant which embosomed the promise of the 
Messiah and the spiritual destiny of all his fol- 
lowers, — of the intrepid Peter, the fervent Paul, 
the loving John, — of the noble army of martyrs, 
— of the great and good, as their ranks have 
been multiplied all down through the Christian 
ages 1 Nor can we confine our thoughts to these. 
With them we associate those whom we have 
known and loved, — our home-born saints, those 
who have taken sweet counsel and lived in holy 
fellowship with us, the tutelar spirits of our 
households, — the parents whose prayers conse- 
crated our infancy, and whose ripened virtue 
strengthened us on our opening way, — the chil- 
dren translated in their innocence from our em- 
brace to the Good Shepherd's arms, — ^the com- 
panions of our youth cut off" in the bloom of their 
beautiful promise. These are the cloud of wit- 
nesses that encompass us ; and, could they be but 
for one moment made visible to the outward eye, 
liow would they 

" reprove each dull delay, 
Allure to brighter worlds, and lead the way " I 



THE CLOUD OF WITNE&SES. 395 

Nor is this view attended by any intrinsic im- 
probability, which makes it hard for our faith. 
We are the unrecognized witnesses of the habits 
and movements of the lower orders of animated 
existence. Why may not the translated spirits 
that have preceded us to heaven be in like man- 
ner the unseen witnesses of our conflicts, failures, 
and successes ? Science brings to view number- 
less tribes of sentient beings too minute for our 
unaided sight. Why may not religion equally 
reveal to us forms and modes of life too ethereal 
for our bodily vision to discern ? Almost every 
spot of earth has its double occupancy ; every 
green leaf, every drop of water, has its myriads of 
living tenants ; the realm of inanimate and that 
of sentient existence interpenetrate each other, 
mingle without confusion, occupy the same space, 
yet appertain to separate systems. Why may not 
the realms of matter and of spirit similarly inter- 
penetrate each other, and blend throughout with- 
out collision or disturbance ? The stirring of the 
summer air, so gentle as to elude our senses, 
wakes melody in the ^olian harp. Why may 
not converse and communion, too subtile for de- 
tection by the dull organs of the perishing body, 
transpire near and around us among glorified 
spirits ? And if, through faith in things unseen, 
through a yearning after the fellowship of the 
holy dead, we clarify the inward sense, and at- 
tune aright the chords of the spiritual nature, why 



396 THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 

may not wo become wind-harps, to vibrate strains 
of celestial harmony, and to echo loftier praise 
than can float on the broken song of our vocal 
worship ? 

Nor need any questionings about a local heaven 
disturb our faith in the presence of these witness- 
es. The laws of spiritual existence, knowledge, 
presence, and intercourse, whether in the body or 
out of it, transcend our philosophy. There may 
be a local heaven, and yet it may be heaven here 
and everywhere ; as in our material firmament it 
is heaven where the sun walks in glory and the 
stars keep their watches, and, at the same time, 
heaven at our fingers' ends. Must not the very 
process of disembodiment bring the pure spirit 
into the intimate presence of God, — reveal to it 
its due place in the ranks of the redeemed, — 
suffuse its whole being with the welcome of the 
Saviour and the benediction of the Father ? And 
if this be so, it must be heaven wherever the 
spirit can remain in communion with God and 
Christ, and in full consciousness of its immortal 
heritage. Especially must it be heaven where 
the affections love to linger, among the scenes of 
past conflict and triumph, among the friends yet 
militant, but pressing on for the prize of their 
high calling. By the form from which life has 
fled, when survivors have clustered around the 
bed of death with calm resignation and unwaver- 
ing trust ; when on the waters that threatened to 



THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 397 

go over their souls tliey have found fast moorings 
by the Rock of Ages ; when the voice of praise has 
gone up for the translation of the departed saint ; 
when the Saviour's words of peace have been 
breathed into every heart, and his loving pres- 
ence is as consciously felt as it was beheld by the 
sisters at the tomb of Bethany, — it has seemed 
to me as if the dying soul need not leave the 
chamber for heaven, but might receive the light 
of life eternal in that very room, might remain in 
the bosom of the stricken household, and yet be 
bathed in the gladness and glory of the house 
not made with hands ; and that to the vision 
purged and clarified by death every tear of be- 
reaved affection might seem a morning dew-drop 
of renewed spiritual life, every sigh an aspiration 
heavenward, every sad thought a harbinger of 
God's own thoughts of peace. And when those 
survivors, instead of sinking under sorrow into 
supineness and selfishness, have heard in the 
death-summons for one of their number the call 
to a more earnest and devoted life ; when they 
have gone forth with a chastened, yet hopeful 
spirit to meet the demands of daily duty ; when 
their prayers have flowed with a freedom and 
fervor unknown before ; when their social sym- 
patliies have been touched to finer issues ; when 
a richer beauty of holiness has attested that the 
earthly vine had not been pruned in vain, — I 
cannot conceive that heaven should have a purer 

34 



398 THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 

joy for the departed, than he might find in watch- 
ing the spiritual growth, the successive attain- 
ments and victories, of those who were dearest to 
his heart. When I witness such fruits of sorrow, 
I always think of the spirit recently removed as 
removed only from outward sight, — as the happy 
witness of the path on which, one by one, those 
for wliom the earthly household has been dis- 
solved are to attain the end of their faith, the 
salvation of their souls. 

Nowhere, it seems to me, may we more ap- 
propriately welcome these thoughts, than at the 
altar, when the memorials of him who is the 
Lord of the dead and the living, of him in whom 
the whole family in heaven and on earth is one, 
are spread before us. If there is a spot on earth 
peculiarly dear to those who have gone from us, 
it is this where they pledged their early vows, 
consecrated their riper years, felt the presence 
and power of the Redeemer, and rejoiced in the 
fellowship of tliose who were as tendrils of the 
same branch of the Heavenly Vine. How many 
are the revered and tenderly beloved forms that 
come up in our remembrance, when we sing 
around the holy table our favorite hymn, — 

" The saints on earth and those above 
But one communion make " ! 

There is the pastor, whose eloquent eye, whose 
fervent exhortations and prayers, whose saintly 
and loving walk, are as fresh in the memory of 



THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 399 

many of us, as on that sad day when his body re- 
posed before this altar on its way to the grave. 
With his image there comes up before us tlie 
numerous array of those who wrought with him 
in every cause of Christ and man ; — those who 
brought to the service the best fruits of genius 
and of liberal culture ; those whose wisdom, ma- 
tured among the busy scenes of life, was conse- 
crated in the patience of faith to the labor of 
love ; those formed for the more tender, gentle 
ministries of Christian benevolence ; the bowed 
in age whose dying prayers were for our peace 
and prosperity ; the fathers and mothers in our 
Israel ; the young translated from their brief al- 
tar-service to the worship of the upper sanctuary. 
How fast thickens for us the cloud of witnesses ! 
Since our last communion, we have performed 
the parting rites of religion for no less than three 
of our circle ; — the veteran disciple, whose ripened 
sheaves were bound, and who was calmly await- 
ing the summons to bear them home ; the ear- 
nest, whole-souled laborer in the vineyard, called 
to go up higher when every heart that could 
breathe a prayer would have interceded for his 
longer stay ; the venerable matron, with mental 
vigor unimpaired, and faith clear as sight, re- 
moved from the home which she could not have 
made happier than it was under the serene sun- 
set of her day, to the larger circle of the beloved 
that have bid her welcome to the Father's house 
in heaven. 



400 THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 

What slioiild be for us the voice of these be- 
reavements ? We think of them with sadness, 
nor can • it be otherwise. God means that by 
such removals our spirits should be more and 
more unearthed, — that our affections should not 
be withdrawn from those that go, but should fol- 
low them, and through our love for them should 
take a stronger hold on the home where we may 
rejoin them. But are they our witnesses, more 
closely present than when they walked with us 
here, more familiarly conversant with our char- 
acters, more solicitous for our spiritual well-being ? 
Have they at once an enlarged comprehension of 
all that we ought to be, and a clearer view of 
what we are ? And do we love them still ? Then 
may they — then should they — form a golden 
chain to bind our affections, desires, and hopes to 
the throne of God and the fellowship of his ran- 
somed. We would not pain them while they 
were with us here ; shall we not much more 
court their approval, now that they are even more 
intimately with us ? We cherished their com- 
munion ; shall it not be even dearer to us, now 
that it may assume the form of heavenly bene- 
diction from guardian angels ? We loved to 
walk with them in mutual counsel and helpful- 
ness ; shall we part from their company, now that 
we cannot take a step with them which urges us 
not Christward and Godward ? They indeed 
have replaced the intermittent strength of their 



THE CLOUD OF WITNESSES. 401 

earthly state by immortal vigor, — they mount 
up on wings as eagles, they run and are not 
weary, they walk and faint not ; and lame may 
be our progress compared with theirs. But as 
none sympathize so cordially with the beginnings 
of the religious life, — with the feeblest sincere 
efforts and aspirations for spiritual excellence, — 
as those of the most advanced experience and 
mature piety, 1 cannot but feel that the bond of 
our fellowship with our friends in heaven is in no 
wise weakened by their and our different rates 
of progress, if we are only true to our means of 
inward growth, faithful to the utmost measure 
of our ability, — if we do God's will on earth in 
the same loving spirit in which they do it in heav- 
en. Only let me thus live, and I cannot feel that 
there is any separating gulf between the two 
worlds, or that, when we are all in one world, 
those who went before me will be too far advanced 
to welcome and enjoy my society as cordially as 
I would theirs. The earlier dead will indeed be 
to us as elder brethren, yet brethren still ; and 
none the less so because they can be, not only 
our companions, but our guides, — not only our 
fellow-worshippers, but our teachers in the re- 
demption-song, — not only our co-workers, but 
our forerunners in every shining path of the Di- 
vine service. 



34* 



SERMON XXXI 



AUTUMN. 

WE ALL DO FABE AS A LEAF. — Isaial\ IxiT. 6. 

The outward world is full of the types of spir- 
itual things. Like the roll in Ezekiel's vision, it 
is written Avithin and without, though often in a 
cipher to which Clirist alone can furnish the right 
key. Especially do the alternations and transfers 
of life in the creation around us correspond to 
those in the human family, so that every year 
seems an epitome of man's life, death, and resur- 
rection. What more obvious symbol of man's 
transitory condition can there be, than tlie fading 
leaves of autumn ? And it is a symbol which 
bears a closer and more varied* application than 
might appear at first thought, — one which we 
may begin to contemplate in sadness, and pass on 
to joy and gratitude ; for the fading leaves have 
not only their lessons of frailty and mortality, 
but their suggestions of a hidden life to be pre- 



AUTUMN. 403 

served through death, and to be restored in vigor 
and beauty. 

" We all do fade as a leaf." Hardly has the 
prime of summer passed, when here and there a 
dry and wilted leaf begins to wake autumnal 
musings, and to remind us" that in the midst of 
life we are in death ; while on the very verge of 
winter there hangs in sheltered nooks leafage 
still unblighted, — the type of those rare excei> 
tions to the common lot of humanity, the few who 
remain unchanged while all is changed around 
them, whose leaf withers not, and whatsoever 
they do prospers. The varied hues of our au- 
tumnal foliage bring to our thought different 
classes of the death-doomed ; — the deep scarlet, 
those who smile when all around them weep, and 
dream sweetly of life while they are sinking into 
the death-slumber ; the pale orange, those who 
seem born but to die, and wither in their earliest 
bloom ; the russet-brown, those who go down 
to the grave in ripened age like a shock of corn 
in its season. And when the work of desolation 
is completed, — when 

" these trees, 
Each, like a fleshless skeleton, shall stretch 
Its bare brown boughs ; when not a flower shall spread 
Its colors to the day, and not a bird 
Carol its joyance, but all nature wears 
One sullen aspect, bleak and desolate, 
To eye, ear, feeling, comfortless alike," — 

have we not in tliis sable close of autumn an apt 



404 AUTUMN. 

type of the wintry grave, where the rich and the 
poor lie down together, and the storms of earth 
beat unheeded over their silent dust ? 0, let 
not nature wither and sink into the tomb, with- 
out reminding us that for man too the grave- 
clothes are ready and the sepulchre is open, — 
that all 

" the sons of men, 
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes 
In the full strength of years, matron, and maid, 
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man. 
Shall one by one be gathered side by side " 

But let us not forget that this season of deso- 
lation is the very reign of beauty. All gorgeous 
hues blend and alternate. There was sameness 
in the summer's green. It was charming; yet 
the eye could promptly receive and easily re- 
tain the impress of the scene. But now, every 
turn of the street, every angle of tlie forest path- 
way, each individual tree, presents its separate 
panorama of colors variously grouped and shad- 
ed, interpenetrating one another at every open- 
ing, and, as they glance in the sunlight or wave 
in the cool breeze, giving us a kaleidoscope with 
ever new combinations from moment to moment. 
Thus does splendor immeasurably beyond that 
of its spring and its prime cover the retreat of 
vegetable life, and spread its multifaced smile 
over the dying year. 

Thus it it, too, with seasons of decline and 



AUTUMN. 405 

death among men. If aught that is human awa- 
kens admiration among the heavenly witnesses^ 
it is not in the buoyancy and gladness of open- 
ing life, nor yet in the heat and turmoil of its 
bvisy and care-cumbered prime. The very vir- 
tues of the true and upright are liable to present 
a soiled and doubtful aspect, on account of the 
dust and strife of the crowded arena, the conflict- 
ing opinions, passions, and prejudices of its actors, 
the hiddenness of motives, and the prevailing ten- 
dency to misrepresent or depreciate whatever de- 
parts from the average standard, even though the 
departure be Christward and heavenward. Then, 
even in the best men, prior to severe vicissitudes, 
there is a tinge of earthiness. They look to 
heaven with eyes dazzled by the glare and glit- 
ter of this transitory life. They find it hard to 
retain the singleness of vision and purpose for 
which they aim. There are, also, depths of spir- 
itual experience, which are not opened while 
hope is undimmed and prosperity unimpaired. 
There is an intimacy of converse with God, a 
fellow-feeling with the suffering, glorified Re- 
deemer, a home-longing for the house not made 
with hands, which cannot be fully reached in 
the bloom and flush of happy youth or busy 
manhood. There are, too, human sympathies, 
tender and beautiful, which do not begin to flow, 
till disappointment, blighting, or decay has passed 
over some portion of the earthly heritage. In 



406 AUTUMN. 

our bright and active days, the heavenly wit- 
nesses may indeed be — we trust they are — our 
ministering angels, yet with a remoter sense of 
kindred. It is under the approaches of the au- 
tumnal chill and frost, that they begin to discern 
a life more entirely resembling their own. It is 
then that Faith puts on her beautiful apparel; 
Hope, her queenly robes ; Love, her wedding gar- 
ment, as the heavenly Bridegroom's steps draw 
near. The richest manifestations of character; 
the communings that can never be forgotten ; 
the heroic forms of devotion and submission ; 
the outgoings of affection too intense for utter- 
ance, overflowing from the faltering tongue on 
eye and lip and brow, — these belong to the cham- 
ber of illness and the bed of death. 

Often is there during the active season of life 
sincere faith and profound religious feeling, while 
an insurmountable diffidence or unreadiness seals 
the lips and ties the tongue, so that the loving 
and devout thoughts, which are all ready to leap 
forth in burning words, are locked up in the dis- 
ciple's heart. But in such cases, approaching 
death opens the floodgates ; the lips grow sud- 
denly eloquent ; the treasures of a rich life-ex- 
perience are poured out for the instruction and 
comfort of surrounding friends ; and we are ready 
to deem the death-chamber a Bethel, — the house 
of God and the gate of heaven. 

Still oftener may we witness the gradual trans- 



AUTUMN. 407 

forming and spiritualizing of character under the 
process of decay and the slow approaches of disso- 
lution. Hore is a man, with serious dispositions 
and purposes, but without a distinctly marked 
religious character. The world goes prosper- 
ously with him, and he loves it more than is con- 
sistent with supreme love to the Father. His 
life is more outward than inward. He has held 
infrequent and slight communion with his own 
soul. Not wholly undevout, he yet has known 
little of the joy of fervent and prolonged converse 
with the Author of his being. But now comes 
the early frost. His leaf begins to wither, and 
he knows that it can never be green again. Un- 
der this consciousness, his thoughts are gradually 
drawn in upon himself ; they go forth to the pros- 
pect of a higher life, which is all that remains for 
his hope ; they seek after God, if haply they may 
find him ; they cluster around the Redeemer, as 
the Author of pardon and the Herald of immor- 
tality ; they are detached from passing and per- 
ishing objects, and fixed on those that are unseen 
and eternal. And now submission makes his 
sufferings beautiful. Patience has her perfect 
work. Serenity and cheerfulness present an un- 
ruffled front to the approaches of disease. In 
his uncomplaining endurance, his gratitude for 
sympathy and kindness, his calm reliance on the 
Heavenly Shepherd as he passes through the val- 
ley of the death-shadow, friends find their post 



408 AUTUMN. 

of service near him a place of privilege, and feel 
that the darkest scenes through which they pass 
with him are irradiated by the clear outshin- 
ing of omnipotent love. Every trait of his char- 
acter that had previously won their regard is 
touched to its finest issues. Sincerity was never 
before so transparent, nor kindness so genial, nor 
affection so tender. Winning graces, which till 
now had hardly revealed themselves, grow with 
every stage of decline, and brighten with every 
day's march to the grave. The spirit seems un- 
clothed of all that is not heavenly, and tints of 
celestial beauty replace the earth-hues that had 
clung to it in the walks of busy life. 

Nor is it only such as I have described that 
feel these blessed influences. The softening, el- 
evating ministry of decline and decay imparts 
new richness even to the loftiest types of virtue 
and devotion. Rigidness and austerity then be- 
come gentle. Exclusive sympathies grow cath- 
olic. Sectarianism expands into a genial senti- 
ment of brotherhood. Stern legality yields place 
to that perfect love which is the fulfilling of the 
law. The entire energy of faith and principle, 
which had sufficed for strong temptations and 
large responsibilities, is now all converged on the 
intercourse, trials, privations, and infirmities of a 
wasting frame and an ebbing life. And as duties 
of a new class arise, — as it is the disciple's mis- 
sion no longer actively to do, but meekly to bear, 



AUTUMN. 409* 

God's will, — the passive virtues, which may have 
been but feebly developed for lack of exercise, 
are called into prominent relief, and bring the 
character into a closer kindred than ever before 
with the Saviour who was made perfect through 
sufferings. There is choice fruit, which is hard 
and acrid all summer long, but which, when the 
oblique rays of the autumnal sun make their way 
to it through the thinned leafage, grows mellow 
and luscious. In like manner, there are charac- 
ters of rare excellence, which present a rough ex- 
terior, till they are laid open to the mellowing in- 
fluences of infirmity and decline. So, too, there 
are traits of spiritual loveliness and beauty, which 
are hidden from the only influences under which 
they could grow by the interests, cares, and pleas- 
ures of the more active years, — shrouded by the 
summer foliage of the life- tree, — and can ripen 
only when the last of earth and the dawn of 
heaven are near. 

I would call your attention to yet another an- 
alogy. Under what gorgeous celestial scenery 
does the leaf wither and fall ! How rich in pic- 
turesque beauty is the autumnal sky ! How soft, 
yet how radiant, its every-day robe of dewy azure ! 
Its sunset drapery how resplendent ! The sun 
sinks upon a couch of the richest purple, fringed 
with burnished gold, with curtains of the purest 
violet and the brightest orange. The western 
clouds seem lakes of liquid amber ; while, above 

35 



410 AUTUMN. 

and around, the heavens are suffused, and the 
tree-tops and hill-sides bathed in the tranquil 
smile of departing day. Then, too, how glorious 
those nights, when the harvest moon chases every 
cloud from the sky, and rides conqueror and 
queen ; and when, in its wane, mystic fires shoot 
up from the horizon, dart in lambent rays from 
pole to pole, span the firmament with their ra- 
diant bow, encircle the zenith with their rejoicing 
crown, and the whole heavens glow as with an 
altar-flame of praise to the Most High ! 

Equally do the heavens brighten over the scenes 
of man's decay and dissolution. Nowhere does 
the Divine love seem so visibly and consciously 
present. Nowhere does prayer flow with so geni- 
al an utterance, and meet so prompt an answer. 
Nowhere reigns so serene a spirit of trust and 
gratitude. Beneath the pensiveness of the death- 
shadow, beneath the very paroxysms of agony 
that rend the hearts of those so soon to be be- 
reaved, flows a current of tranquil gladness, of 
joy that the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth, that 
the issues of life and death are in his hands, that 
the dying are wrapped in the mantl^e of his love, 
that his thoughts of peace may be poured into 
their souls when the dearest earthly voices can no 
longer reach them. These are the. seasons — 
however severe the conflict of feeling while they 
last — on which we love to look back, and recall 
the tokens of a guiding spirit, an all-sufficient 



AUTUMN. 411 

love, a Father who " forsake th not his children 
when their strength faileth them." 

Yet another analogy presents itself. The fad- 
ing of the leaf is not death, but a rallying of life 
to its source and centre. Never is the vitality of 
the tree more vigorous than when its juices and 
its energies are concentrated in the roots, to with- 
stand the winter's cold and storms, and to elab- 
orate, deep beneath the frost and snow, the ele- 
ments of renewed bloom, more ample growth, and 
richer beauty when returning spring shall issue 
the resurrection fiat. Thus, when the pure and 
good fade and sink into the grave, our faith tells 
us they are not dead. Only the leaf has with- 
ered. Only the outer form has perished. The 
life which glowed in the countenance, nerved the 
arm, and clothed the frame with strength, has 
been gathered up in its fulness into the soul, 
whence it emanated, and, with the winter of but 
a moment, has already grown green and vigorous 
again, — for ever green, for ever young, where 

" everlasting spring abides, 
And never-withering flowers." 

The fading of the leaf, too, reminds us of the 
things that change not and die not. The same 
earth from which God first brought forth the 
herb yielding seed and the tree yielding fruit, re- 
ceives the dying trust of every herb and tree. 
The same mountains that emerged from tlie 
waters of the flood hide their summits in the 



412 AUTUMN. 

clouds. The same heavens wherein the psalmist 
beheld the glory of God array themselves in 
their autumnal robe of splendor. The same 
moon by which Boaz wrought his harvest task 
makes our nights glorious as day. The same 
stars that kept watch over the infant world per- 
form their unchanging circuits. Thus is it among 
the vicissitudes of life and the ravages of death. 
Mortal affairs are ever fluctuating. The current 
of time sweeps on, undermining and ingulfing 
man, with all his possessions, plans, and hopes. 
Generation after generation is borne away to join 
the great congregation of the dead. Meanwhile 
God sits serene and unchangeable, and while the 
waves of time wash over his footstool, they shake 
not the foundations of his throne. And, as Na- 
ture trustingly commits her germs of vernal life 
to the bosom of an unchanging earth and the 
kindly influences of an unchanging sky, so let 
us, in humble faith, — while our bodies fade as 
the leaves fade and die as the flowers die, — yield 
up the germs of immortality within us to Him 
in whom the dead live, and to whom all flesh 
shall come. 

The day will arrive when Nature's trust must 
fail. This earth, these heavens, though now in 
their age-long spring, will have their autumn, 
when the stars will fade and fall like leaves, 
when the sun will cut short his circuits, when the 
visible monuments of creative power will cease 
to be. 



AUTUMN. 413 

" The seas shall waste, the skies to smoke decay, 
Rocks fall to dust, and mountains melt away." 

But our souls, in faith and love committed to 
the keeping of Him who is tlie same yesterday, 
to-day, and for ever, shall live on in fairer scenes 
and among purer joys, though the earth be re- 
moved and the heavens be no more. 



SERMON XXXII. 



GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 

VERILY, VERILY, I SAY UNTO YOU, HE THAT BELIEVETH 
ON ME. THE "WORKS THAT I DO SHALL HE DO ALSO ; AND 
GREATER WORKS THAN THESE SHALL HE DO ; BECAUSE I GO 
UNTO MY FATHER, AND WHATSOEVER YE SHALL ASK IN MY 
KAMB THAT WILL I DO, THAT THE FATHER MAY BE GLORI- 
FIED IN THE SON. — John xiv. 12, 13. 

In the phrase " greater works than these," 
ivorks is printed in Italics, to show the absence 
of any corresponding word in the original Greek. 
Had the Evangelist written " greater ivorks ^^^ as 
this word is usually employed by him to denote 
miracles, I should suppose that he meant " great- 
er miracles " ; and yet it would be hard to say 
what were or could be greater than those wrought 
by Jesus in his own person. But in the absence 
of that word, I would expound our text as fol- 
lows : — " You, my disciples, after I have left the 
world will indeed be endowed, for the propaga- 
tion of my religion, with the power of working 
miracles like my own. But you will do greater 



GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 415 

things than miracles. Your victories over your 
own souls, your sacrifice and self-denial, your lof- 
ty moral attainments, will possess a far higher 
spiritual heauty and glory than can belong even 
to the healing of the sick or the raising of the 
dead. And such gifts will be bestowed upon you 
through my continued sympathy and aid ; for I 
am going from you to your Father and my Fa- 
ther, and, in heaven as here, I shall still be a 
medium of holy influence for you, shedding upon 
you the choicest of heaven's blessings, granting 
you all that you pray for, that thus, through my 
mediation, God's name and grace may be honored 
in your obedience and holiness." 

There is a narrative in the tenth chapter of 
Luke, in which our Saviour gives utterance to 
the same sentiment under very impressive cir- 
cumstances. He had sent forth the seventy dis- 
ciples endowed with power to heal the sick, and 
commissioned to preach the Gospel. They re- 
turn to him with joy, and, it would seem, with 
some leaven of vanity ; for the foremost item of 
their report is, " Lord, even the demons are sub- 
ject to us tlirough thy name," — that is, they 
had cured not only common diseases, but epilepsy 
and insanity, which the Jews of that age ascribed 
to demoniacal possession. Jesus rejoins : ''/be- 
held Satan [the impersonation of moral evil] 
fall like lightning from heaven" ; that is, " Mij 
thoughts were occupied, not with the outward 



416 GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 

miracles to be wrought through your instrumen- 
tality, but with the inroad which you might make 
on the reign of irreligion and guilt. You have 
started Satan from his exalted throne. The pow- 
ers of darkness are no longer in the ascendant. 
You have inaugurated a new era, not for suiFer- 
ing bodies, but for sin-bound souls." And then 
he goes on to say : " Behold, I give unto you 
power to tread uninjured on serpents and scorpi- 
ons, and over all the power of the enemy, — over 
whatever can do you harm, — and nothing shall 
by any means hurt you. Yet no gift of this kind 
is' for your own sakes, or is a fit object of self- 
congratulation. Rejoice not that the demons are 
subject unto you ; for these are works wrought 
rather through you than by you, — they imply 
the power of God, but furnish no test of your 
own characters. Rather, then, rejoice that your 
names are written in heaven, — that you have 
the faith, devout feeling, and holy purpose which 
can fit you for heavenly happiness." 

Our text, thus illustrated, simply teaches the 
transcendent greatness and glory of goodness. 
In this sense, it derives its richest illustration 
from our Saviour's own character. His mira- 
cles, indeed, we cannot over-estimate ; but they 
teach us less of himself than of God. They open 
the depths of the Divine attributes and counsels, 
not of the Saviour's soul. They call forth the 
glad shout, " God hath visited and redeemed his 



GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 417 

people," but would not of themselves elicit the 
outpouring of the heart, " Lord, thou knowest 
that I love thee."' In truth, they derive their 
greatest attractiveness from the manifestations of 
liis own character connected with them, — from the 
tenderness of his compassion, the profoundness of 
his sympathy, the warmth of his love. It was 
before he had called Lazarus from the tomb, that 
the by no means friendly by-standers exclaimed, 
" Behold how he loved him !" We look upon his 
miracles without surprise, because we feel that 
there was that in his whole life and spirit which 
was greater than they, — that which made his 
lordly walk among the powers of nature no less 
the type and expression of his godlike personal- 
ity, than is our subjection to them the token of 
souls often clouded by error and sin. But our 
associations of his spiritual glory linger chiefly 
around the scenes of his humiliation, distress, and 
suffering ; — when he overcame the gainsaying 
of his enemies by the meekness of wisdom ; when 
he lifted his midniglit prayer on the lone moun- 
tain ; when he raised the weeping penitent with 
words of good cheer which no other lips in Ju- 
daea would have dared to utter ; when, having 
power to save his life, he chose to lay it down ; 
when he poured forth his sympathy and inter- 
cessions at the paschal table ; when, in Gethsem- 
ane, mortal agony soothed itself into calm resig- 
nation, and rose in godlike strength to meet the 



418 GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 

impending doom ; when the crown of thorns la- 
cerated that benignant brow ; when he trod the 
way of grief under the burden of the cross ; when 
from that instrument of torture, as from a regal 
throne, he dispensed pardons, loving mandates, 
heavenly benedictions. We spontaneously feel 
that there was more glory in these manifestations 
of character than in the creation of a world, — 
a universe. 

As regards the Apostles, though they were en- 
dowed with miraculous gifts, to excite the atten- 
tion and help the faith of those to whom they car- 
ried the word of the Lord, do those gifts enter at 
all into our estimate of their characters ? Does 
not Paul's shaking the viper from his hand with- 
out harm seem a very small matter, compared 
with his renunciation of emolument, office, and 
honor, of the high places in society which he 
might have adorned, of the halls of learning in 
which he might have shone pre-eminent, and his 
adhering to the despised cause of the crucified 
Nazarene ? Are not the chains which clanked 
upon his wrists, as he wrote those words of un- 
earthly trust, gladness, hope, and triumph, im- 
measurably more glorious than the garlands and 
sacrifices which the idolaters of Lystra, astound- 
ed by his miracles, brought to him as a god in 
the likeness of man ? 

But our concern is chiefly with our own char- 
acters ; and our constant danger is that we neg- 



GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 419 

lect or underYalue, for outward doings, successes, 
and attainments, the greater than miracles which 
we may achieve and he in our spiritual conflicts 
and victories, — in the virtues that may clothe 
and the graces that may adorn our souls, — in 
the Divine image which we may transcribe and 
bear with ever-growing vividness of resemblance, 
— in the realization, which may be ours, of those 
good words of the Saviour, " The glory that thou 
gavest me, I have given them." Let us look, for 
our instruction, at some of the modes in which 
the sentiment of our text may be verified in our 
experience. 

1. There is that which is greater than miracle 
in resistance to evil. The self-emancipated from 
the thraldom of appetite and vicious habit are 
among the strongest and noblest of the race. 
Those of us whose early nurture was under fa- 
voring circumstances, so that our faults never de- 
veloped themselves into vices, can hardly know 
how intense is the power of the degrading and 
destructive appetites and passions which hold so 
many in bondage. We speak with literal truth, 
when we say that it is more than a miracle for 
one thus fallen to rise again. And yet he may. 
The energy of his will slumbers, yet is not dead. 
The power of that name, in which the impotent 
man walked and leaped and praised God, is prof- 
fered for his rescue. He may, by agonizing 
prayer, get a purchase on the throne of the Om- 



420 GREATER THAN MIRACLES, 

nipotent, by which he can lift the mountain-load 
of sensual habit and longing, and cast it into the 
sea. But he must gird himself as to a great 
work. He must be resolute, imperative, in his 
self-denial ; heedless of the thousand pretences on 
which the expelled demon will strive to open, as 
by a mere hand's breadth, the door closed against 
him ; deaf to friendly voices that would lure him 
a little way back on the steps which he cannot 
begin to retrace without measuring them all back 
again. And, above all, he must fortify himself 
by earnest prayer, by a profound consciousness 
of the present God, by a deep sense of the powers 
of the world to come, by the constant feeling that 
lie is doing battle for his soul, — for all that can 
be worth living for, — for all that can minister 
to his acceptance and gladness when he stands 
before the Divine tribunal. He who shall thus 
wrestle with the foul fiend, and pluck from his 
brow the palm of victory, has won for himself 
lofty praise and enduring glory, has written his 
name high among those great in the sight of 
God, has wrought that of which the miracles of 
the first Christian age were but the symbol and 
shadow. 

2. Love is greater than miracle ; for " proph- 
ecy shall fail, tongues shall cease, knowledge 
shall vanish away, but love never faileth." The 
miracles which our Saviour wrought for suffer- 
ing humanity were types and models of the still 



GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 421 

greater achievements wrought by his followers 
through his helping spirit. His word, which 
bade the paralytic take up his bed and walk, has 
sent its echo all down through the Christian ages. 
It breathes in the hospitals of the Old World and 
the New, where even corporations and communi- 
ties take the place of the good Samaritan, and 
tenderly woo back health to the diseased organs 
and soundness to the shattered frame. It in- 
spires those who move as angels of mercy through 
the streets swept by swift and deadly pestilence, 
smooth the brow knotted in mortal agony, and 
pour thoughts of peace into the departing soul. It 
prompts and gladdens the steps of those who, with- 
out parade or ostentation, carry comfort and hope 
to tlie home of destitute illness and infirmity, and 
watch as with a daughter's assiduity the flickering 
life-lamp of desolate and helpless age. The touch 
which healed the loathsome leper has been trans- 
mitted through all the lineage of the Saviour, 
and is still put forth to relieve those forms of 
guilt and degradation, from which fastidiousness 
recoils and sensibility stands aloof, and which the 
worldly-wise would leave to perish uncared for. 
It is this that reaches the prisoner in his cell, the 
slave in his house of bondage, the squalid hea- 
then of our great cities, the despised and reject- 
ed of all but Christian hearts. The power which 
gave sight to the man born blind is put forth, 
through the followers of Christ, in world-embra- 

36 



422 GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 

cing efforts for the enliglitenment of those that sit 
in darkness, in the instruction of the children of 
ignorance and vice, in the outstretching of Gos- 
pel ministries till the vast globe is girdled by re- 
sponses to the Divine call, — " Say to the north, 
Give up, and to the south, Keep not back ; bring 
my sons from afar, my daughters from the ends 
of the earth." These various forms of philanthro- 
py are greater than miracles, inasmuch as the ef- 
fect is greater than the cause, the oak than the 
acorn, the field white for the harvest than the 
handful of seed-corn cast into its bosom. 

3. There is a power of endurance that is great- 
er than miracle. No spectacle is more sublime 
than that of a truly Christian soul in severe af- 
fliction. No soul can feel so deeply ; for religion 
intensifies the affections which a bereaving Prov- 
idence may wound, adds tenderness to the sen- 
sibilities which may be lacerated by the thorns 
on the life-road, enhances the power of suffering 
no less than of gladness. It is not, then, indif- 
ference, it is not an impassible nature that checks 
the rising murmur, and calls forth the A^oice of 
serene submission, " Thy will, not mine, be done." 
That sufferer has gone down into the profoundest 
depths of agony, — has trodden with bleeding 
feet the bloody wine-press ; but He who trod it for 
us all is at his side, breathes into the disciple his 
own spirit, dictates the words of his own prayer, 
and holds forth the trophies of his own victory. 



GREATER THAN MIRACLES. 423 

And when, in the wreck of human joy, faith can 
kneel and adore ; when " Father, I thank thee! " 
goes up from the home and heart made desolate ; 
when heavenly Peace folds her wings over the 
stricken spirit ; when the hope of immortality ir- 
radiates the gloom of bereavement or of penury, 
— we then witness more than miracle, — a more 
subtile, a more penetrating power of Jesus, than 
when lifeless matter moved at his word, though 
that matter were the lifeless tenement of a living 
soul. 

4. Finally, there are phenomena greater than 
miracle in tlie death of the Christian. Only those 
who are familiar with the scene can appreciate 
the awful, momentous solemnity of the closing 
hour of life. The sundering of every tie of home 
and of society, the separation from all that has 
been pursued and enjoyed, the inconceivable 
change that awaits the soul, the plunge into the 
dread unknown, the dense, palpable blackness 
which to the earthly vision lies beyond the parting 
moment, — no wonder that, with all these things 
in view, the soul, shuddering 

"to o'erleap the bounds, 
Yet clings to being's severing link." 

How sublime, then, the faith which looks within 
the veil, which feels and anticipates no evil, which 
can express its willingness, its joy to depart and 
be witli Christ, wliich has not a lingering doubt 
or fear, but can say, — " I know in whom I have 



424 GREATER THAN ]VnRACLES. 

believed ; I know that my Redeemer liveth ! " 
The soul puts forth in life no power to be com- 
pared with that thus manifested in dying, — not 
indeed its own strength, but the overcoming might 
of Him who conquered death. Nowhere are we 
so sure, beyond the shadow of a doubt, of the ful- 
filment of his words, — " Lo, I am with you al- 
way, even unto the end of the world." The voice 
that waked the widow's son from the bier and 
Lazarus from the tomb, vibrates along the ages, 
and is heard anew by the disciple as the death- 
shadow closes over him. The resurrection-touch 
thrills through his spirit, before life has left its 
mortal habitation. The- Lord's call. Come forth, 
echoes through the walls of that crumbling ten- 
en*nt, as once througli those of the sepulchre in 
Bethany. The miracle of that hour reproduces 
itself in more than miracle for the strong man 
and him who bows under the weight of many 
years, matron and maid, the unlettered follower 
of Jesus and the great, wise, and noble among 
the ranks of his disciples, as with one voice they 
take up the glorious strain of apostolic triumph, 
— "0 death, where is thy sting? grave, 
where is thy victory ? Thanks be to G-od, which 
giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus 
Christ." 



SERMON XXXIII 



ALL POWER GOD'S. 

" GOD HATH SPOKEN ONCE ; TWICE HAVE I HEARD THIS, 
THAT POWER BELONGETH UNTO GOD. ALSO UNTO THEE, 
O LORD, BELONGETH MERCY : FOR THOU RENDEREST TO 
EVERT MAN ACCORDING TO HIS WORK." — Psalm Ixii. 11, 
12. 

The very being of God includes omnipotence. 
If he exists, he is the ultimate source of all pow- 
er. Yet with regard to the Divine power there 
are two tenable theories, differing widely, as it 
seems to me, alike in their intrinsic claims on our 
credence, in their hold on Scriptural authority, 
and in their adaptation to our spiritual nature 
and needs. According to the one view, the Al- 
mighty has lodged in the various agencies of the 
material world capacities and tendencies, by vir- 
tue of which they prolong the order and harmony 
of nature, perpetuate the races of organized and 
animated being, and work out a course of events, 
incidentally disastrous, yet in the main beneficial, 

36* 



426 ALL POWER god's. 

and adapted to produce a vast and ever-increasing 
preponderance of happiness over misery, and of 
good over evil. But as to incidental evil, God in 
no way interposes, directly or indirectly, to avert 
it, or to transform it into good, so that we have 
no guaranty, as regards any disastrous event, of 
its actually beneficent use or capacity, nor yet is 
such an event to be regarded as good, except as 
inseparable from a generally beneficent plan. Ac- 
cording to this theory, human agency is uncon- 
trolled in its own sphere, and the mischief which 
man may do to his fellow-man is limited only by 
the strength of his will and the range of Ms ac- 
tivity ; while there is no happy or hopeful view 
that we can take even of the external evil which 
guilt and crime produce in the world. 

According to the other view, God is actively 
present in the entire universe, upholding all 
things by the word of his power, guiding the 
course of events by his own perpetual fiat, — pre- 
serving, indeed, a certain uniformity in sequences 
which we call cause and effect, so far as is needed 
to assist human calculation and to give definite 
aim to human endeavor, but behind the order of 
visible causes adjusting whatever takes place with 
immediate and constant reference to the needs, 
the deserts, and the ultimate well-being of his 
creatures ; ordaining the seeming evil no less 
than the seeming good, making even wicked men 
his sword ; so overruling malignity and evil pas- 



ALL POWER god's. 427 

sion as to work out their own ultimate extinction 
and the ascendency of truth and right ; so mod- 
ifying the results of vicious agency, that they 
shall either, on the one hand, harmonize with the 
salutary affliction which flows confessedly from 
his appointment, or, on tlie other, subserve the 
essential ends of moral demonstration, rebuke, 
and retribution. 

I hardly need say, that this last is the view 
directly sanctioned by the expres-s language and 
the entire tenor of Scripture. Indeed, as much 
as this is admitted by the Christian advocates of 
the former theory, who regard the sacred writers 
as by a bold, yet legitimate figure ascribing to 
the direct action of the Almighty whatever takes 
place under a system initiated by his power and 
sanctioned by his wisdom. But there was, it 
seems to me, immeasurably more than figure in 
their minds. To them the curtain of general 
laws, which hangs in so dense drapery before the 
eyes of modern philosophy, was transparent, and 
they saw no intervening agency, no intermediate 
force, between the Creator and the development 
of his purposes in nature and in providence. 
^' He maketh the winds his angels, and flames of 
fire his ministers." " The voice of the Lord is 
upon the waters ; the God of glory thundereth." 
" These wait all upon thee, that thou mayest give 
them their meat in due season." " Shall there 
be evil in a city, and the Lord hath not done it ? " 



428 ALL POWER god's. 

" The Lord killeth, and maketh alive ; he bring- 
eth low, and lifteth up." " Surely the wrath of 
man shall praise thee ; the remainder of wrath 
thou wilt restrain." " The hairs of your head 
are all numbered." " The sparrow falleth not to 
the ground without ycur Father." If these are 
mere figures, I know not how we are to assign 
limits to figurative interpretation, or what Scrip- 
tural language there is, of which we may be sure 
that it means what it seems to mean. 

But without pressing phraseology of this class, 
which occurs on almost every page of the Bible, 
we might derive the same inference from the duty 
of unlimited, unqualified trust constantly incul- 
cated in Scripture by explicit precept, by the ex- 
amples of saints under both the Old and the New 
Covenant, {^nd by that of the Divine Founder of 
our religion. This trust is impossible under any- 
thing less than a perfect Providence ; for under a 
system only generally beneficent, how know we 
but that we are the destined victims ? In a lot- 
tery with but one blank to a thousand prizes, how 
know we that the one blank is not ours ? Nay, 
we shall be sure to think and to feel that it is 
ours in the stress of impending, or the fresh sor- 
row of realized, calamity; and the philosophic 
trust which we may cherish in a general Provi- 
dence will fail us at the very times when all that 
we can do is to submit, believe, trust, and hope. 

Our view of the direct administration and per- 



ALL POWER GOD*S. 429 

feet providence of God is confirmed by the re- 
sults, or rather by the non-results, of science. 
Six thousand years of research have failed to re- 
veal the latent forces, to lay bare the hidden 
springs, of nature. Gravitation, cohesion, crys- 
tallization, organization, decomposition, — these 
are but names for our ignorance, — fence-words 
set up at the extremest limits of our knowledge. 
That Nature pursues her course and events take 
place under such and such conditions, is the ut- 
most that we can say. We find it impossible to 
conceive of any innate or permanently inherent 
force in brute matter, but by the very laws of 
thought we are constrained to attribute all power 
to mind, intelligence, volition. 

I admit, however, that without the revelation 
of immortality there would be great difficulty in 
the admission of a Providence always benignant ; 
and while we might even then well hesitate to as- 
cribe power to lifeless matter, we might be driven 
to the Oriental hypothesis of conflicting spiritual 
agencies, — a semi-omnipotent evil intelligence 
in perpetual antagonism with the Supremely 
Good. The difficulty does not attach itself to 
the afflictions, however severe, which fall to tlie 
lot of those who are growing in moral excellence ; 
for we always see in a progressive character an 
alembic in which sorrow is transformed into 
spiritual nutriment, — a divine alchemy through 
which all things work together for good ; and the 



430 ALL POWER god's. 

heaviest trials which are thus converted to be- 
neficent uses are no more a mystery than are the 
lowering days and dreary rains of the spring as 
regards the fields and meadows. Nor yet need 
the calamities that befall the highly privileged, 
but non-improving, create an iasuperable diffi- 
culty ; for they may be regarded, on the one hand, 
as a merited retribution, or, on the other, (and I 
believe with greater fitness,) as proffering the 
best adapted and most hopeful means — for the 
inefficacy of which they themselves are account- 
able — of awakening them to a sense of their re- 
lation to God, their obligation to him, and their 
amenableness at his tribunal. 

But there are numerous cases, in which heavy 
calamity falls, and rests prolongedly, on those 
whose unprivileged condition renders trial utter- 
ly useless. Here we are fully relieved by the as- 
surance of immortality ; for the period of their 
endurance bears no assignable proportion to the 
eternal life at the threshold of which they wait 
and suffer. Their time of privilege is beyond 
our earth-bound vision, but it is hastening on for 
each and all ; and it is entirely conceivable that 
the remembered sufferings of their sojourn here 
may be among the choicest means of their spirit- 
ual nurture in heaven, and that, for the fervor of 
their zeal, and the strength of their allegiance 
to the Saviour whom they will first know when 
they emerge on the farther side of the shadow 



ALL POWER GOD*S. 431 

of death, it may be said of them, as of such multi- 
tudes that belonged to his earthly fold, — "These 
are they which came out of great tribulation." 
We do wrong to our Christian faith, if sincere, 
when we exclude it from our philosophy, — when 
we fail to concentrate its full radiance on the 
else dark passages of the Divine Providence. 
We do equal wrong to our intuitive sense of jus- 
tice and to the benign spirit of our religion, 
when, because tribulation and anguish in the 
world to come are the destined lot of those who, 
having the full light of the Gospel, refuse to 
avail themselves of it, we tacitly include in the 
same doom, or, from complaisance to the advo- 
cates of a sterner theology, we refuse in thought 
to exempt from that doom, those to whose case 
we might apply the spirit of our Saviour's words, 
— " If I had not come and spoken unto them, 
they had not had sin." 

We may thus set aside such objections as flow 
from unavoidable human suffering, so far as it is 
the direct act of God. And, these objections set 
aside, do not insuperable difficulties lie in the 
way of any supposition other than the direct 
action of the Almighty in the entire external 
universe ? Omnipresence, omniscience, is implied 
in the very conception of God. But can his, at 
any moment or in any part of his creation, be a 
powerless knowledge, an inert presence, — a mere 
watching of machinery wound up and put in 



432 ALL POWER god's. 

motion in unknown ages past, and to run for un- 
known ages yet to come ? Can we conceive of 
him as present, and not vitally, actively present ? 
I cannot, and I rejoice that I cannot. To my 
thought, the bloom and verdure that clothe the 
earth this day are no less his immediate handi- 
work, than were those on which Adam's eyes 
opened in Eden. The trees and shrubs that now 
wave and rustle in the breeze are no less suffused 
with his just-spoken blessing, than the burning 
bush on Horeb was vocal with his audible voice. 
The waves are no less upheaved this morning by 
the direct action of his poAver, than the waters were 
of old piled up by his might to wall in a safe path 
for his ransomed to pass through. The scanty 
seed-corn of late committed to the earth will be 
no less multiplied thirty, sixty, and a hundred- 
fold by his wonder-working providence, than the 
widow's handful of meal grew by his benediction 
during the weary months of famine. Do you 
say that there is something belittling in the 
thought of this minute agency of the Infinite 
God ? What is not minute, — what concerns of 
nations, planets, or systems are vast and grand to 
him, whose worlds crowd the telescopic vision by 
myriads, and stud the heavens as countless as the 
sand on the sea-shore ? These distinctions of 
magnitude and importance vanish in his sight. 

" To him no high, no low, no great, no small ; 
He fills, he bounds, connects, and equals all." 



ALL POWER god's. 433 

But what shall we say of man's power over 
outward nature and events ? We are conscious 
of free volition. Is it ours to execute our own 
volitions; or is it literally in God that we live, 
and move, and have our being ? I cannot con- 
ceive of divided power, of concurrent sover- 
eignty, in the same domain, — of our ability to do 
what he would not have us do. That we can 
will what he wills not, we know only too well ; 
but must we not reach the conclusion that he ex- 
ecutes our volitions for us whether they be good 
or evil, — nay, that the execution of these voli- 
tions, whatever they are, is always good, — that 
he literally makes " the wrath of man " to praise 
him, and "the remainder of wrath" — that whose 
mission would be unavailing for the purposes of 
his righteous administration — he will so "re- 
strain " as to frustrate of its end ? Do we thus 
make God the author of evil ? Far otherwise. 
So long as his spiritual children are endowed 
with freedom of volition, sin is possible ; and so 
long as sin exists, the occurrence and contin- 
uance of its consequences in all their vileness 
and deformity is an essential part of the system, 
which is ultimately to abolish sin, to establish the 
reign of universal righteousness, and to weld free 
agency and right volition in a union to be made 
sacred and permanent by the finished and trans- 
mitted experience of the long ages of violence, 
wrong, and guilt. 

37 



434 ALL POWER god's. 

Let me illustrate this thought by a supposed 
case. You have a child whom you would train 
in habits of soberness, self-control, and rigid vir- 
tue. Your time is at your own command ; your 
resources are unlimited. You determine that he 
shall see in some outward form the reflection of 
every disposition that he cherishes, of every way- 
ward choice and every right purpose. For each 
forthputting of genial feeling, of conscientious- 
ness, of kindness, you create before his eye some 
form of beauty or utility. You follow up his peev- 
ishness and petulance by placing and keeping in 
his sight some repulsive object or scene, — the 
fit embodiment of the temper you would rebuke. 
You produce, and compel him to witness pro- 
longedly, havoc and desolation among objects un- 
der his cognizance, for every fit of groundless or 
excessive anger. You thus write out his whole 
moral history in the aspect of his nursery or play- 
ground, and sustain under his constant inspection 
mementos that he must needs see and feel of 
whatever good and whatever evil there is in his 
mind and character. Had you the ability thus 
to educate your child, think you not that it would 
be the readiest and most effectual way of erad- 
icating the evil and establishing the supremacy 
of the good ? 

It is thus, it seems to me, that God is educat- 
ing the races and the generations of men. To 
suppress the consequences of sin would be to 



ALL POWER god's. 435 

rpamfest indijSerence to moral distinctions, to per- 
petuate the supremacy of guilt, to make evil grow 
with the march of the ages, and fasten its eternal 
hold on the heart of humanity without remedy 
or hope. So long as man will sin, it is immeas- 
urably for the best that his sin should do its ap- 
propriate work in the eyes of the sinful and the 
tempted. So far as that work is external in the 
form of calamity, there is nothing that need dis- 
tinguish it from the so-called direct visitation of 
an afflictive Providence. For those who are in 
successful training for a higher sphere of being, 
it has its double ministry, in the winnowing, hal- 
lowing power of all sorrow over the principles 
and affections ; and in sustaining the hatred and 
dread of moral evil by the innocent experience of 
its bitter fruits. For those who are yet to be 
won to duty, the unsightly and odious consequen- 
ces of sin are the most effective preachers of re- 
pentance and righteousness, often heard and heed- 
ed by those who have turned a deaf ear to every 
other mode of appeal. For the unprivileged and 
irresponsible sufferers by the guilt of their breth- 
ren, we know not what essential and blessed 
ministries such remembered experiences may sub- 
serve in that spiritual education which, we cannot 
but believe, is destined for them, under better 
auspices, in other realms of being. 

Nor can we sv^ppose that God will give effect 
to a guilty d'sjvu'^itiuu or purpose in any other 



436 ALL POWER god's. 

way or instance than may serve the ends of disci- 
pline, warning, rebuke, or merited punishment. 
In thousands of ways his providence may and does 
make void the thought of evil, the counsel of vio- 
lence, — avert the blow which guilty man would 
aim at the peace of his fellow-men. Where his 
wisdom sees fit to save, he can say as eifectually 
to human malice as to wind and wave, " Touch 
not mine anointed, and do my servants no harm." 
Over the agitated sea of depraved passions, over 
the field of reckless carnage, over the haunts of 
those who lurk privily for the blood of their breth- 
ren, the fan of his discriminating providence waves 
with no less unerring choice, with no less mer- 
ited or merciful doom, or needed and signal de- 
liverance, than over the daily paths of disease and 
death among the walks of quiet and peaceful life. 
Evil and death come to none, for whom it is not 
the fit time and way in the counsels of retributive 
justice, or the best time and way in the counsels 
of paternal love. 

I am aware that this view may to some minds 
seem at first thought harsh and revolting. But 
not so when we consider the only alternative. 
For can God have left us unsheltered, to be 
preyed upon and sacrificed by the evil passions of 
our brethren ? Are we cast solely at the mercy 
of our fellow-men? In our exposure to the un- 
numbered forms of violence and recklessness that 
not unfrequently beset us, is our only security the 



ALL POWER god's. 437 

chance that they may not select us as their vic- 
tims ? Can we suffer or perisli in a time or way 
in which God sees and knows that it is not best, 
not good, and only evil, for us ? — and yet the 
sparrow falleth not to the ground without him. 
In our ignorance of what a day may bring forth, 
are we liable, not alone to what our Father may 
appoint, but to what may be done in defiance of 
his will and contravention of his purpose con- 
cerning us ? If so, what or where is our ground 
of trust for the life that now is ? Where shall 
we roll off the burden of agonizing solicitude ? 
How shall we dismiss our care because God car- 
eth for us? Our faith in Providence must ex- 
tend to human agency no less than to the so- 
called direct action of the Almighty ; else it can 
have but little practical influence as regards the 
present life, can be of little avail in evil times 
and among evil men. 

There are indeed mysteries in Providence, — 
heights which we cannot scale, depths which we 
cannot fathom. We seek only to look between 
the leaves of the immeasurable volume, where 
Jesus has unloosed the seals. I have barely en- 
deavored to develop what we must believe, if we 
would receive our Saviour's lessons, and imbibe 
his spirit, of implicit trust and self-surrender. 
Where Reason fails, let Faith usurp her place, 
and let us rest in the calm assurance that what 
we know not now we shall know hereafter. This 



438 ALL POWER god's. 

we do know now, — that our times are in our 
Father's hands, our path through life marked 
and guarded by his watchful providence, and 
that to the soul that stays itself on him all things 
must work together for good. And in the des- 
tined home of our spirits, while the heavens shall 
declare his righteousness, the dark forms of evil 
will disclose their ministries of love ; from the 
caverns of the grave will come voices of praise ; 
and even sin — mercifully punished in time that 
it might not weigh down our souls to perdition, 
repented, forsaken, forgiven — will only swell 
with deeper loy the anthem of unceasing adora- 
tion* 



THE END. 



-:1R^ 



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